Up the River (1930)

Up the River: Directed by John Ford. With Spencer Tracy, Claire Luce, Warren Hymer, Humphrey Bogart. When paroled trustee Steve and former inmate Judy who try to put their criminal lives behind them are blackmailed, two career criminals come to their rescue.

“Up the River (1930) u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003e** (out of 4) u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eJohn Fordu0026#39;s prison comedy has been forgotten in the directoru0026#39;s filmography and what limited knowledge people have about it is more with its stars. Spencer Tracy and Humphrey Bogart made their first big splash on the big screen here and this would be the only film theyu0026#39;d do together. In the film, Bogart falls in love with a female prisoner (Claire Luce) and they plan to get married once she gets paroled but a man from her past comes after Bogart once heu0026#39;s released from jail. Needing help, two buddies (Tracy, Warren Hymer) escape from prison and go after the man. Thereu0026#39;s also a subplot dealing with a big baseball game between two prisons but this doesnu0026#39;t get too much attention. I was left pretty disappointed with this film because Fordu0026#39;s direction really doesnu0026#39;t bring too much life to the screenplay, which, to the directoru0026#39;s credit, is all over the place. It starts off as a comedy but then we switch gears to a rather strange drama. Some of this might be due to Ford having the screenplay rewritten after MGMu0026#39;s The Big House stole some of his ideas. The final thirty minutes drag by pretty badly as this is the same time that the laughs stop. Thereu0026#39;s some funny stuff early on including one scene where the men are getting ready for bed, four to a cell, and they realize they only have three pillows. Tracyu0026#39;s film debut is a very good one and I was shocked to see that Tracy personality on full display at such an early time in his career. That street tough attitude mixed with his cocky side comes off very well here. I was also shocked at Bogart who certainly isnu0026#39;t playing what weu0026#39;d come to see in the future. Here heu0026#39;s constantly smiling, getting pushed around and I guess youu0026#39;d say he plays a real dork. Heu0026#39;s actually very good here, which shocked me since some of his pre-fame roles feature him looking pretty silly. From what I read, Bogart and Ford hated one another after Bogart called the director u0026quot;Jacku0026quot; so this was sadly the only film they made together. The Fox DVD of this is in incredibly bad shape with some jumps in the print and cuts in the soundtrack.”