I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang (1932) - Systemic injustice bared in LeRoy's crackerjack crime drama

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A dangerous holdup in what appears a criminal underworld environment is presented on this murky poster for Mervyn LeRoy's I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang

After having served military duty in WWI, James Allen returns to civilian status but does not want factory work; he wants to build something new up as an engineer! But following an unfortunate arrest, he is sentenced to 10 years in a chain gang. - He manages to escape! - But his past finds him ...

 

I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang is written by Howard J. Green (The Millionaire (1957, TV-series)) and Brown Holmes (Castle on the Hudson (1940)), with Sheridan Gibney (The Locket (1946)) contributing uncredited work, adapting the autobiographical I Am a Fugitive from a Georgia Chain Gang! (1932) by Robert Elliott Burns, and directed by great Californian filmmaker Mervyn LeRoy (No Place to Go (1927)).

Thoroughly suspenseful, fast-paced, I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang relies on a thrilling story for its success. The woman, who forces a lucrative marriage through by blackmailing our protagonist, is one of the film's exciting, credibly played (by Glenda Farrell (Bonanza (1964, TV-series))), memorable characters. All of it rings 100 % true. 

SPOILER A very exciting climax ends up in a shockingly tragic, stirring ending: 'The system can crush a good man' is the icy lesson here. Paul Muni (Hudson's Bay (1940)) is beautiful and outstanding as the hero in this electrical, indignant film.

 

Related post:

 

Mervyn LeRoy: The Green Berets (1968) - Wayne's gung ho pretty picture of the Vietnam War clashes with reality (co-director)

 

Watch a trailer for the movie here

 

Cost: 228k $

Box office: 1.599 mil. $

= Huge hit (returned 7.01 times the cost)

[I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang premiered 9 November (Washington D.C.) and runs 93 minutes. LeRoy was paid 13.2k $ for his direction of the film. Shooting took place from July - September 1932 in California, including in Los Angeles, with stock footage of Chicago, Illinois also used. The film grossed 650k $ in North America, 40.7 % of the total gross. It was nominated for 3 Oscars, winning none: It lost Best Actor (Muni) to Charles Laughton in The Private Life of Henry VIII, Picture to Cavalcade and Sound to A Farewell to Arms. The film also won 2 National Board of Review awards. It was instrumental in the appeal and release of Burns and "several other chain gang prisoners nationwide in the U.S." in 1933. LeRoy returned with Hard to Handle (1933). Muni returned in The World Changes (1933). I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang is fresh at 96 % with an 8.20/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang?

The Green Berets (1968) - Wayne's gung ho pretty picture of the Vietnam War clashes with reality

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An apocalyptic painting of the hell of the Vietnam War adorns this gung-ho poster for Ray Kellogg, John Wayne and Mervyn LeRoy's The Green Berets

 

A Vietnam War-skeptical, liberal newspaperman heads out with new green berets (US Special Forces) to Vietnam to fight the unprincipled, Communist Vietcong madmen.

 

The Green Berets is written by James Lee Barrett (Fool's Parade (1971)), based on the same-titled 1965 novel by Robin Moore (The London Switch (1974)), and directed by Ray Kellogg (The Killer Shrews (1959)), Californian master filmmaker though uncredited here, Mervyn LeRoy (No Place to Go (1927)) and co-director/co-star John Wayne (Blood Alley (1955)). Wayne helped the film to creation due to his worries over the rampant anti-war sentiments of the time and his wish to present his own staunch pro-military stance to the public.

How far one's own political nerves can take of Duke's (Wayne's) highly creative positive spin on the Vietnam War, the Vietnamese people and the US troops is an individual circumstance, but in any case The Green Berets is regrettably a thoroughly empty and dull film, so that finally there's not much more to it than its more or less offensively made-up, clean, orderly and neat world views and some bizarre scenes: Like the one in which a soldier lets the ever-happy Vietnamese boy orphan in the army camp share his bed ...

George Takei (You Don't Mess With the Zohan (2008)) is a merciless anti-VC Vietnamese local hero. There's also macho bravado war comical bits that are as misplaced as they are unfunny. The film is mostly shot in Georgia, which naturally enough looks far from the Asian country of the actual plot. And, just to be clear, Wayne, otherwise a hero of mine, puts his foot squarely in it here. - The Green Berets is a real stinker.

 

Related posts:

 

Ray Kellogg: The Giant Gila Monster (1959) - Sullivan shines in Kellogg's low-tech Texas drive-in classic

John Wayne: Cahill U.S. Marshall/Cahill (1973) - John Wayne upholds the law in exciting late-career western (star)

The Cowboys (1972) or, John Wayne and the Cowboys (star)

Chisum (1970) - Middle-of-the-road John Wayne action-western (star)

El Dorado (1966) - Hawks, Duke and Mitchum's great western (co-star)

Circus World/The Magnificent Showman (1964) - Hathaway and Bronston's grand, ill-fated curio (co-star)

The Conqueror (1956) - John Wayne's inauspicious turn as Genghis Khan (co-star) 

Flying Leathernecks (1951) - Ray's gung ho, Technicolor aviation spectacle (co-star)

Fort Apache (1948) - Wayne and Fonda clash in Ford's solid western of a massacre of Indians (co-star)

Back to Bataan (1945) - Wayne in the Pacific (star)

Watch a 5-minute clip from the film here

 

Cost: 7 mil. $

Box office: 8.7 mil. $ (North-American rentals alone)

= Uncertain

[The Green Berets premiered 19 June (New York) and runs 142 minutes. Wayne visited South Vietnam in 1966 and decided to do a film in support of the Army special forces. He turned down a part in The Dirty Dozen (1967) to do Green Berets. Wayne bought out Moore's involvement in the production with 35k $ and 5 % of undefined profits from the film. The script was developed with the US Army, who had objections and ideas for molding it. Shooting took place in Alabama, Georgia, California and Florida from August - December 1967 with extensive cooperation with the Department of Defense providing air crafts, uniforms and consultancy. Wayne rejoiced as the public braved anti-war picketing at theaters and paid admissions to take the film in the black within 3 months, as it earned 8.7 mil. in North-American rentals despite also getting critically destroyed. Roger Ebert gave it a zero/4 star review, translating to a notch under than this one. The foreign gross numbers are regrettably unknown. Kellogg retired from directing and only returned as an associate producer on a single TV movie five years later; LeRoy retired after his work on the film; and Wayne directed again, albeit uncredited, in Big Jake (1971). As an actor he returned in Hellfighters (1968); David Janssen (Ring of Fire (1961)) in The Shoes of the Fisherman (1968); and Jim Hutton (Where the Boys Are (1960)) in Hellfighters (1968). The Green Berets is rotten at 23 % with a 4.20/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

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