Law & Order (TV Series) Cradle to Grave (1992) User Reviews

Freezing To Death.

[rmax304823 · 7/10 · 2 December 2012]

A baby is left in a hospital waiting room. He's wrapped in blankets, stuffed into a cardboard box, and dead of hypothermia. Seretta and Logan track down the young mother who left her baby at home when she went to work, the baby sitter being expected momentarily, as usual. This time, the man answering the front door of the shabby apartment house refuses to let the baby sitter in, claiming he doesn't know who she is. The temperature in the apartment drops to twenty degrees and the baby dies.

There are the usual red herring and a network of relationships that need to be explored before the real heavies emerge -- a couple who are harassing all the tenants in the rent-controlled apartment, trying to drive everyone out so that the owners of the building can charge higher rent.

"Look, I'm sorry about the kid but with the rent THEY pay, I can't even AFFORD to heat the apartments," explains one of the owners.

There are some interesting comments on rent control, but not many, and some arguments over whether the charge should be murder or reckless endangerment, and the court translator screwed up a witness's use of Spanish, but it ends with justice being properly served, at room temperature.

The Duchess of Mean

[bkoganbing · 8/10 · 14 November 2017]

This one is a real heart breaker. A dead infant already turned blue and stone cold is found on a hospital floor in the emergency room which brings Paul Sorvino and Chris Noth on the case. After a lot of leg work the blue blanket the victim was wrapped in leads them to Bruklin Ward the baby's mother.

The tale she tells is how she was living in a rent controlled building in an apartment she inherited from her grandmother. The building has a superintendent Jose Tirado who doesn't maintain anything and an enforcer Rocco Sisto who harasses the tenants verbally and physically. In fact Noth catches Sisto right in the act.

They work for landlady Karen Lynn Gorney who is a mini-me copy of Leona Helmsley Manhattan's Queen of Mean. I guess Gorney rates being a duchess in a scaled down version of Helmsley's modus operandi.

Richard Brooks gets a lot of credit for being the one who brings the previously thought of untouchable Gorney down. You have to see how he does it.

The various Law And Order shows did episodes on the rent control laws. This is one of the best.

Frozen

[safenoe · 7/10 · 21 August 2023]

This is a unique Law & Order episode in that the outcome of the case was in the end credits. Anyway, this is very tragic episode where corruption is at the highest levels and everything is not what it seems with a slum landlord and bribes to keep the heat down sadly.

I'm catching up on the early seasons of Law & Order, where Chris Noth was truly Mr. Big as a prelude to the bigger series.

Anyway, all credit to the production crew in the way they film in the busy bustling streets of New York City, without any distractions from bystanders and gawkers. This was the day before cell phone technology.

Definitely didn't leave me frozen

[TheLittleSongbird · 10/10 · 17 April 2020]

Quite the opposite actually, in fact it melted, or should that be broke, my heart even as somebody who hasn't been in the situation. Even reading the plot synopsis alone prior to watching "Cradle to Grave" is enough to make anybody a lot of both heart-break and anger. If anybody feels those emotions just reading the plot synopsis, wait until one sees the episode itself. Both of those emotions are still there but multiplied to the maximum degree.

"Cradle to Grave" is not just one Season 2's best episodes, it's also one of the most emotionally powerful along with "Asylum" and "God Bless the Child". And quite possibly one of the best episodes ever for anything to deal with this challenging but still relevant, and worth addressing always, subject. Am not an expert when it comes to rent control, but one doesn't have to be and "Cradle to Grave" does a great job at making this interesting and accessible.

As usual for 'Law and Order', the production values are solid, not too drab or confined which is great for such an intimate approach. The music never feels too constant or too loud, while the direction allows one to take in everything going on, and there is as usual a lot to take in while never being pedestrian. As always for the show, "Cradle to Grave" is talk-heavy, but it doesn't feel overly so and the writing intrigues and doesn't ramble.

The story makes one feel a wide range of emotions and is both gutsy and heart-breaking, it is hard not to relate here and one doesn't have to been in the situation to be heart-broken. Bringing a pulling no punches approach to sensitive material, which one of the show's main strengths when on form. What it has to say about rent control and such educates and is handled accessibly but not simplistically. It is also done in a non-biased way, even when one hates the responsible.

Paul Sorvino and Chris Noth succeed in bringing edge to thoughtfully written material, while Michael Moriarty and Richard Brooks (the latter having one of the episode's meatier and most satisfying moments) deliver their juicy dialogue with intensity. Karen Lynn Gorney quite frighteningly portrays one of the most hatable female supporting characters, maybe supporting characters full stop, of the season.

Overall, a truly powerful, tear-jerking and wonderful episode that one of the early seasons' must sees. If anybody has just gotten into 'Law and Order' and the franchise and has only seen Season 7 onwards, "Cradle to Grave" is proof that the earlier seasons should not in any way be neglected. 10/10

Dead baby causes writers to Invent evil slumlord episode

[evony-jwm · 1/10 · 26 April 2021]

Plot line fits expectations but Not reality; too many goofs; go to emergency with a dead baby, leave a dead baby, a delivered crib, single mom no support, babysitter caused no charges, gangster slumlords, then the "legal" process starts.

Simply unbelievable!