Sadly Over-hyped

Really Surprised!

Watch something else. There are very few redeeming qualities to this film.

A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

All the performances were excellent in this movie, except maybe the head prison matron played by film veteran Jane Darwell. This film was exciting from the first moment with a very early rock 'n roll song TOM'S BEAT to the last scene. Prison scams, girl fights, threats of violence at every corner, a prison break, lesbianism, all adds up to an entertaining film. Stand-out performance by Adele Jergens as a gun moll.

A pretty young woman by the name of "Anne Carson" (Joan Taylor) gets mixed up with two other men in a bank robbery and gets a 5-to-10 year prison sentence even though she declares her innocence. Along with that, $38,000 was stolen and since she left one person at the bank and the other person is dead, everybody thinks she hid the money. And everybody wants it bad. Anyway, for a women-in-prison (WIP) film made in the mid-50's this movie wasn't too bad. Not only did Joan Taylor give a pretty good performance but she was rather cute too. Along with that, I liked the way the director (Edward L. Cahn) depicted her lesbian cell-mate "Melanee" (Helen Gilbert). Although certainly tame by today's standards, it was rather racy for this particular time-period. I also appreciated the fact that her other two cell-mates, "Jenny" (Adele Jergens) and "Dorothy" (Phyllis Coates) weren't bad on the eyes either. After all, they could have looked a lot worse. All in all then, I rate this movie as slightly above average.

**SPOILERS** Woman prison flick involving sweet and innocent Anne Carson, Joan Taylor, who ends up taking the rap for the notorious Medesto Bank robbery where one of her partners in crime ended up getting killed in a police shootout. It's the surviving member of the robbery trio Paul Anderson, Lance Fuller, the actor not the 1950's and 1960's world champion weight lifter who set Anne up after he fled a night club that both he and Anne were hiding in during a police raid.In prison it's the prison Chaplin Rev.Fuller, Richard Denning, who feels that Anne got a raw deal and is determined to straighten things out for her. That's quite a job for the good Reverend since Anne is shearing her cell with tough as nails Jenny, Adele Jergens, and Melanee, Helen Gilbert, who are determined to find out where Anne hid the cash, $38,000.00, from the bank robbery that's never been recovered. There's also convicted murderess Dorothy played by Phillis Coates the former "Adventures of Superman" TV show's Lois Lane as one of Anne's cell-mates. The severely mentally deranged Dorothy suspects every woman in prison of being the one who took off with her husband and child whom she ended up up murdering. And with Anne no exception she's targeted by Dorothy for death as soon as she turns her back on her.It's in fact Paul Anderson who goes all out to find the stolen cash by crashing Anne's pop's Pop Carson's, Raymond Hatton, shack in the country and holding him hostage until his daughter, who's now behind bars, can come up with the stolen cash. Pop for his part is so cool and unafraid of the gun toting Anderson that at time he almost challenges him to shoot him! That's probably so he can have an excuse to finally get himself out of this corny movie by being killed off in it.***SPOILERS*** It's Rev.Fulton who ends up saving the day as well as Anne & Pop Carson by tracking down Anderson in Pop Carson's place and then duking it out with Paul Anderson. By then both Jenny & Mclanee were history with Dorothy, who just dropped out of sight, no where to be seen. Not much to recommend here but actor Raymond Hatton's amazing and almost effortlessly performance as the nonchalant and I don't give a you know what Pop Carson! The guy is so cool that he takes coolness up to higher level as well as lower temperature. As for the big hero in the movie Rev. Fulton he, wearing a bullet proof vest, has no trouble dispatching Lance Fuller who's played by actor Paul Anderson. But I couldn't keep from wondering if he would have had such an easy time dispatching that other Paul Anderson who back in the 1950's and 1960's was considered to be the strongest man in the world!

Less-than-thrilling, the film drags but the ending is goofy enough to make it possibly worthwhile. Features earthquakes that come from nowhere, a boxing preacher, and girls in prison who seem not to have been quite locked up. Trouble ensues.