Crashout (1955)

Directed by Lewis R Foster; produced by Hal E Chester

A violent prison break results in more than three dozen convicts escaping from their cells. Only six survive the night, hiding in an abandoned mine. There, they learn that one of them, now wounded, has stashed in the mountains loot stolen from a bank years before, and, in return for helping the injured man, the other five will share in the money. But honour among thieves is proverbially lacking, and even co-operation is minimal as the criminals flee and fight their way toward their goal.

Crashout lives up to its title, from the opening moments until the end. It’s grim, hard and uncomplicated, a story of six men with little to lose, and who care for almost nothing beyond their survival. The writing is uncompromising in the creation of the characters, who, like most humans, give glimpses of sympathy, but who are, for the most part, simplistic and brutal.

The most sympathetic character is Quinn (Arthur Kennedy) who, alone among the six, was not incarcerated for murder; he is serving twenty years for embezzlement. It may be thought that he was included principally to make at least one character likeable. Yet even after he explains his motives for theft, and one senses his regrets, he nonetheless lusts after money as the only real salvation he can see.

Each of the characters is different, without much explanation given: their characters are evident in how they act and what they say. There are touches of actual concern beyond selfishness, such as when Quinn tries to help a fellow escapee shot later in the film; the latter worries that Quinn will be left behind if he stays to help. But this really is a gritty story of survival of the fittest.

There is no elaboration of the actual escape, nothing about its planning; those elements are not part of the story. The only hint as to the chaos and suddenness of the break-out is one prisoner’s boast that he stole a radio while running through the warden’s office. The movie begins with the drama of the escape, and the story is that of the evasion. What happens to those involved, how they act and react, is the tale to be told.

The cast is full of top-level supporting players. Kennedy is joined by William Bendix as Duff, the toughest and most dangerous prisoner; Luther Adler, as Mendoza, whose loquacious stories hide uncaring amorality; William Talman, as a demented former clergyman; Gene Evans, as the simple Monk, and Marshall Thompson, as the young and desperate Lang. Beverly Michaels plays a young single mother the prisoners coerce into giving them shelter. She illustrates another kind of prisoner. The writing is good enough in fact to show a number of vignettes of even tertiary characters, which are interesting.

The direction is a fine companion to the writing, which makes sense, as the director co-wrote the screenplay with the producer. Crashout is probably Foster’s best work behind the camera, but he wrote a number of winning scripts, including Mr Smith Goes to Washington and The More the Merrier. Cy Endfield has been listed as an uncredited writer on Crashout.

A good, solid prison-escape story, Crashout doesn’t let any of the characters off easy, and throws the viewer in with them right from the start. It’s involving enough of a movie to keep the audience captive until the end.