Convicted Woman (1940) User Reviews

The Mayoress of Hell

[MartynGryphon · 6/10 · 3 March 2020]

I watched this film as I have set my self the goal of seeing every Glenn Ford movie before nukes, climate change or Coronavirus takes me, regardless of how superficial his role in them.

The film's plot is an exact cross between two James Cagney movies. Each Dawn I Die (wrongly convicted inmate becomes embittered and troublesome) and The Mayor of Hell (new prison governor appalled at the harsh treatment takes over and allows the prisoners to govern themselves).

Not a great movie by any stretch of the imagination set in a Woman's prison and one that would have faired better had it been made in the pre code years as these movies need to be a bit seedier and risqué rather than sanitised as it is a very grim thing we're dealing with.

The usually solid and reliable Ford is wasted here, but Rochelle Hudson does a good turn as the innocent woman sent to stir. June Lang is great as the evil and conniving 'Duchess' but the stand out for me is Lola Lane as the streetwise but good hearted con with some great comic one liners.

An OK way to waste 65 minutes, but this Is a story that should have been made way back in 1932 with Barbara Stanwyck in the lead when she was at her most sassy.

Great to see a young Glenn Ford at the start of his career, but don't expect The Big Heat.

Looking Good in the Big House

[boblipton · 7/10 · 7 August 2009]

The best thing about this movie is Benjamin Kline's cinematography. Little noted, he was the DP of more than 300 films, including a lot of B westerns and Three Stooges shorts. Yet he always had a great eye and with a compliant director -- and that pretty much describes Nick Grinde -- he could shoot a handsome movie. This is one of them, with its early film noir prison photography. He even uses a couple of subdued iris shots very effectively. Notice how the heavy shadows disappear and the camera begins to move after the prison reforms begin.

Mr. Kline never won an award, but he always did a good job, whether shooting a Tom Mix western (take a look at the surviving prints of SKY HIGH and marvel at how well they have aged) or Moe poking Curly in the eye -- comedy calls for bright flat lighting. He worked for more than fifty years and ended his career behind the camera of some TV movies: westerns, of course.

The story is pretty much of a retread of those crusading reform-the-prisons movies, like 20,000 YEARS AT SING-SING and CASTLE ON THE HUDSON. It hews strictly to the Production Code and it would be another decade and a half before lesbianism began to creep into this sort of movie. Rochelle Hudson, a good actress who never got beyond the Bs does a fine job,. Yet while her performance is spot on, she always looks ready to slip out of that prison uniform she's been wearing all day working in the prison laundry and into an evening gown for a night on the town. Few of the other actors, including a very young Glenn Ford are particularly good, which I blame Nick Grinde for.

This was quite obviously intended as a major production for Columbia. There are no major actors, but a lot of them for the crowd scenes. Although the reworked plot and mediocre acting by the majority of the cast don't do a thing for this, the solid performance by Miss Hudson and brilliant camera-work by Mr. Kline make this a superior movie.

"Dead End" Women.

[byzyman · 6/10 · 26 September 2021]

This is essentially a remake of the 1938 Dead End Kid/Humphrey Bogart movie "Crime School", except with women instead of the Dead End Kids. Rochelle Hudson plays the Billy Halop role and Frieda Inescort fills in for Bogart. Also borrows some of the plot from "Hell's Kitchen" with Ronald Reagan.

Very tame for a women's prison movie by today's standards. Not as entertaining as the Dead End Kid versions, but well done and easy viewing.

Familiar but well made.

[planktonrules · 6/10 · 2 March 2022]

In the 1930sand into the 40s, Hollywood made a lot of films similart to "Convicted Woman"....films that advocated prison reform, rehabilitation and humane treatment for the prisoners. While not as hard hitting as films like "Crime School", "20,000 Years in Sing Sing" and "I Was a Fugitive From a Chain Gang", "Convicted Woman" is well made and entertaining...particularly for a B-movie.

When the story begins, Betty (Rochelle Hudson) is going on a job interview and ends up being arrested for theft! While the evidence against her isn't clear and she has no record, the judge sentences her to a year in a women's prison. Once there, Betty ends up seeing just how cruel and awful the place can be...and she wants out...even if it means trying to escape. However, when a new warden is brought in, things improve...except for Betty's attitude...at least initially. By now, she's hardened, cynical and full of hate....thanks to the prison and its evil matron.

While this prison looks like paradise compared to men's prisons in movies, the movie did a good job of making you care about the women AND sympathize with them. Additionally, it's pretty well made for a B. I'd rate it hgher except for one minor problem...I've seen quite a few similar films...too many to list them all above. Still, it's better than just a time-passer....and it's a chance to see young Glenn Ford in one of his earliest roles.

"If they are not criminals when they get here, they certainly are when they leave."

[classicsoncall · 6/10 · 6 August 2023]

A one-year sentence to a woman's prison for a ten-dollar theft!!?? Even if Betty Andrews (Rochelle Hudson) was guilty, which she wasn't, a reasonable judge would probably have requested restitution and perhaps community service. Even for 1940, that seemed a little bizarre if not barbaric. But that's the story, so I guess you have to go along with it. While not as hard hitting as 1950's "Caged" or 1955's "Women's Prison", this look at crime and punishment was intended to make a statement about inhumane prison conditions and the need for reform. When one of the inmates commits suicide, rehabilitation minded Mary Ellis (Frieda Inescort) is put in charge of the Curtis House of Correction, and with the aid of newspaper reporter Jim Brent (Glenn Ford), helps Betty achieve the pardon she was striving for. Helping her own cause by requesting a dance night for her fellow inmates, Betty's plans are almost scuttled later when she's kidnapped by thugs tipped off by her nemesis, 'The Duchess' (June Lang). By not making it back by curfew during a limited Thanksgiving parole, her sentence could have been extended while putting Miss Ellis in jeopardy for not informing the prison commissioner of the unusual strategy. By leaping into action, Brent rescues Betty and gets her back in time to a waiting pardon, and in a most unlikely ending, Brent and Miss Andrews close out the picture in a clinch even though there was no build up to a romantic involvement between the two. If you're a Glenn Ford fan, you might want to catch him in the 1950 programmer titled "Convicted", but be aware that he's on the opposite side of the bars in that one as a prison inmate himself!

Sweethearts of Sigma Chi

[dougdoepke · 19 August 2009]

If you can accept that a women's prison is basically a sorority house waiting to be organized, you might enjoy this programmer. Betty Andrews (Hudson) is in the wrong place at the wrong time and goes to prison as a result. She's an innocent victim of mistaken identity, and had the screenplay extended this tough-minded premise into the prison itself, something memorable, like Caged (1950), might have resulted. Instead, the prison population turns out to be young, shapely (except for Tubby), and well-scrubbed. Even the "boss con" Duchess (Lang) looks ready for a night on the town. Of course, the casual cruelty of the uncaring system toughens Betty in a flash, transforming her into a potential social menace, that is, until crusading reformer Mary Ellis (Inescourt) arrives.

Now, I'm on Ellis's side. Prisons should be as humane as possible, not only for the good of the inmates, but for society as well. But this is Hollywood at its phoniest, where every pitfall is overcome by a near miraculous turn of the script. Look at how easily Brent (Ford) is able to locate the overdue Betty or how compliant the commissioner is or how quickly even Duchess turns around. The message here is a laudable one, namely, that kindness works. However, it's spread on in such simple-minded fashion that it becomes little more than propaganda for a good cause. Perhaps the screenplay reflects New Deal optimism of the time, and worked for those reform-minded audiences. Now, however, the movie's main interest is to fans of a lively young Glenn Ford before he learned the power of low-key.

Right or wrong, a prison is not a country club.

[mark.waltz · 5/10 · 16 June 2019]

A sassy screenplay aids this B women's prison movie a great deal in spite of progressive viewpoints that are a little too cheerily presented to be realistic. The accidental wearing of the same dress of a department store thief ends up with Rochelle Hudson being sentenced to probably the worst prison in her district. Even with powerful defense attorney Freda in escort on her case, she is found guilty for something she did not do. When she gets to the prison, she finds it is run by a corrupt matron (Esther Dale, in one of several similarly cast roles) and a female princess known as "he duchess" (June Lang). With the help of returning prisoner Lola Lane (who provides much of the sass), Hudson becomes accustomed to the ways of the clink. Getting the message to reporter Glenn Ford that a prisoner whose death was listed as pneumonia was actually suicide causes Dale to be demoted and Inescort to be given the top job, which causes the prison's severe rules to be eliminated and a more relaxed atmosphere to be instituted. But Dale and Lang continue to scheme and this results in Hudson being kidnapped when Inescort arranges for a group of prisoners to have furlough at Thanksgiving.

Certainly, prison reform is a serious issue that remains pertinent until this day. but the way that these girls, seeming more out of a sorority than an actual women's prison, are granted an easier existence is far too sudden and far too experimental. Inescort is directed to be extremely cheery, more like a Girl Scout den mother than a prison warden. it's more of the same for Esther Dale who might have seen play prison matrons in at least two other films and she is just as ruthless as she was in those. In spite of its ridiculous twist, it is still an enjoyable film because the dialogue is a lot of fun and the film flashes by very quickly. It's nice to see Ford at the beginning of his career, pretending at one point to be an attorney to fool Dale while the audience knows that he is a reporter. The scene I wanted, Dale confronting Ford for his deception and him basically telling her off, does not unfortunately occur but there is a delightful denouncement concerning her character at the end, as well as for the trouble making duchess.

More women behind bars

[bkoganbing · 5/10 · 10 February 2021]

Convicted Women was Glenn Ford's third film and the first of three that he made with Rochelle Hudson. According to son Peter's biography of his dad he liked working with Hudson, but wasn't crazy about their work together.

Ford is billed all the way down in the cast at 5. He plays a newspaper reporter who along with attorney Frieda Inescourt befriends Hudson who gets herself railroaded into a shoplifting rap and sent off to women's prison.

It's a pretty rotten place run by chief matron Esther Dale and June Lang who is the queenpin among the prisoners and has her own gang. The usual cliches concerning prison pictures especially those for women are found here.

Some of the others in this distaff prison population are are Lola Lane, the tragic Mary Field whose death sparks an investigation and in a small role Donna Reed.

The script has a lot of holes in it, but this was a B picture and I'm sure it wasn't on Harry Cohn's priority list. It's passably entertaining.

A good prison film

[searchanddestroy-1 · 29 November 2023]

From Columbia Pictures, I don't know many pictures from this era, and especially about prison topics. Warner Bros, Metro Goldwyn Mayer studios were rather the lead companies speaking of this scheme. This one is not an escape story, but an interesting tale showing an unusual point of view about the penitentiary system in the USA. Young Glenn Ford doesn't really justifies by itself to see this one; just wait five or six years and you'll have a great Glenn Ford. It's better to enjoy the Rochelle Hudson's performance. The story offers nothing exceptional, not really great scenes, nothing to remember, just a good little prison film.

Girl prison

[nickenchuggets · 7/10 · 3 May 2024]

While I just randomly decided to watch this movie (believing it to be noir), it actually bears a closer resemblance to Safe in Hell, a Humphrey Bogart film about juvenile delinquents I talked about years ago. By some strange coincidence, Convicted Woman also includes an actor familiar to noir movies; one who was just in something I saw earlier this week. The setup to this film is really simple. A girl named Betty Andrews (Rochelle Hudson) is looking for a job in a department store. She gets the job, but for whatever reason, a jealous coworker intentionally misplaces a dress Betty was meant to sell to a customer after taking the customer's money. The woman complains to the manager that she gave a salesperson money and she never received the dress. Adamant this woman was Betty, the latter is called into the manager's office and is found to have 10 bucks (the price of the dress) in her purse. Although she claims she always had that much money in there, she is taken away by the cops for allegedly robbing a customer. Betty's lawyer tries to defend her in court, but ultimately, she is found guilty and sentenced to one year in a facility called Curtiss House of Correction. Betty is especially angry at a reporter named Jim (Glenn Ford) as he showed up right when Betty was arrested and only seems concerned with turning her misfortune into an interesting read. When Betty is taken to prison, she finds a truly horrible place led by a bitter old woman named Mrs. Brackett. Although favoritism is against prison protocols, Brackett has two lackeys named Nita and Georgia, otherwise known as "The Duchess." Right from the beginning, Georgia tries sabotaging Betty's good standing with the prison authorities. During dinner one day, the girls all rise up and protest the slop they are being fed, and Betty is encouraged to throw one of her shoes at Brackett. She does so, and Georgia, having seen it, immediately rats her out. Betty's punishment is to work in the laundry, located in the prison's basement. It is brutally hot, and another inmate named Gracie is visibly ill from being forced to work such long hours at the machines. Betty tells Gracie to go relax while she finishes her work for her. When she's all done, Betty checks on Gracie, only to find she has hanged herself. Brackett and the others try to cover up what happened to Gracie, saying she was sick for a long time, and tell Betty if she says otherwise she will be punished. Betty forms a temporary alliance with Georgia, the latter offering to smuggle her out of the prison in a mattress truck, but as soon as Betty hops in, Georgia informs Brackett about the escape attempt. For such a severe violation, Betty is punished with being put in solitary. However, she managed to send a secret note to Jim during a meeting with him in Brackett's office, in which she tells the truth about Gracie's demise. Jim causes an outrage with the incident, and Brackett is replaced as supervisor with Mary Ellis (Frieda Inescort), Betty's former lawyer. Mary promises to make the prison more hospitable and gets rid of solitary confinement, bad food, and allows the girls to govern themselves. Brackett tells Mary she's forgetting one thing: every woman in here is a criminal. Betty is brought out of solitary and grows to like Mary, and is even elected to represent the girls. Concurrently, Brackett and Georgia scheme to get the former back in command. Georgia finds out that Mary is planning to give ten girls temporary parole to enjoy Thanksgiving and a night out. When Brackett learns of this, she calls her boss, who is enraged at the thought of criminals being let out into the streets without their sentences being done. Georgia arranges to have Betty abducted so she does not make her curfew. Brackett and Georgia both hope this event will show how irresponsible Betty is, and how putting Mary in charge of this place was a mistake. Thanks to a tip from one of the girls, Jim finds out Betty is being held captive at a broken down roadhouse and wrecks the car of her captors. During the distraction, he rescues Betty and they drive back to Curtiss. Georgia is beaten up by one of the other girls after what she did to Betty becomes known, and right when Mary is about to lose her job to Brackett, Betty and Jim burst in. A black-eyed Georgia apologizes for everything she did to Betty, and Jim is given custody of Betty with permission from Mary. This movie was ok. Most of it focuses on how grueling life inside a prison meant for women can be, and shows how girls are usually much nastier than boys when it comes to harassing somebody. I found Georgia to be thoroughly unlikeable as she tries to undercut Betty at every turn. Not only because it pleases her boss, but because it pleases herself. Even in adulthood, it's common to find people who are willing to be best friends with their superiors just to give subordinates a hard time. The movie also brings up an interesting point in that lots of these so called "correctional" facilities are rotten to the core, but people on the outside have no way of knowing that. The only ones who are aware of it are the inmates, and those ruling with iron fists will make sure they are abused as many times as it takes to keep their mouths shut. There isn't really much to this film other than that it was entertaining, and seeing a women's prison isn't something that was at the heart of many old movies.