Directed by Lambert Hillyer
Produced by E.B. Derr
Original Screen Play by John W. Krafft
Photographed by Arthur Martinelli
Film Editor: Russell F. Schoengarth
Musical Director: Abe Meyer
Cast: Robert Kent (Dave Tyler), Anne Nagel (Julie “Freckles” Warren), Sidney Blackmer (Gregory Warren), Victor Kilian (Bennett), Norman Willis (Russell), Maude Eburne (Mrs. Magruder), Ben Alexander (Jeff Palmer), Howard C. Hickman (Warden), Joan Barclay (Elaine)
At the risk of becoming the Film Masters fan club, here’s another stellar release from the company — Lambert Hillyer’s 1939 crime picture Convict’s Code.
A football star (Robert Kent) is framed for robbery to keep him from playing in a big game. Out on parole after three years, he sets out to find out who set him up. As luck would have it, he finds the guy (Sidney Blackmer), unaware it’s him, and falls in love with his kid sister (Anne Nagel).
Meanwhile, when Kent goes looking for the witnesses who put him away, they’re gone — dead or disappeared. And you thought your life was complicated!
Convict’s Code is a cheap little hour-long Monogram crime picture. That alone is enough to recommend it. But it’s got great hard-boiled dialogue, a fairly unique approach to the gotta-find-the-guys-who-really-did-it plotline — and a good role for Anne Nagel. She was in some great stuff, from The Green Hornet serial (1940) and Man Made Monster (1941) to Never Give A Sucker An Even Break (1941) and Armord Car Robbery (1950, her last film).
Robert Kent was in some cool stuff, too, from Charlie Chan and Mr. Moto pictures to The Phantom Creeps (1939) and Gung Ho! (1943) to Rebel City (1953) and a couple of episodes of The Long Ranger. Of course, Lambert Hillyer made all sorts of B pictures, from the first Batman serial (1943) to a slew of late-40s Monogram Westerns.
Along with their stunning Blu-Rays of Roger Corman’s Filmgroup pictures, Film Masters has released a few Poverty Row films like this on DVD. There are no extras and the transfer doesn’t glisten quite like their The Terror (1963) does. But this is the best Convict’s Code has looked on home video — and is likely to ever look. It’s from a very, very clean 35mm print from the UK (with Monarch logos on it).
I hate to attach a lesson in Economics to this, but here it is: we have to support the companies still dedicated to the old films and physical media. If we do, there will be more. I don’t want to think of the alternative.
Convict’s Code comes highly recommended to fans of Poverty Row pictures like this. Can’t wait for the next one!
The Hannibal 8 