Inside the Walls of Folsom Prison

Inside the Walls of Folsom Prison is written and directed by Crane Wilbur. It stars Steve Cochran, David Brian, Philip Carey and Ted de Corsia.

Inside The Walls Of Folsom Prison is an excellent movie that shows some of the abuses that were practiced on prison inmates back in an earlier time in our history. I saw that this movie was listed on Turner Classic movies and I was thrilled and I could not wait to watch it.

Unfortunately, Crane Wilbur's direction is not strong enough to allow INSIDE THE WALLS OF FOLSOM PRISON to be anything more than a routine prison melodrama illustrating prison reform when a man with new ideas (DAVID BRIAN) is given a chance to change the brutal practices of Warden Rickey (TED DeCORSIA).And fans of STEVE COCHRAN will be surprised that he has such a peripheral part when he's given top billing over David Brian.

"Inside the Walls of Folsom Prison", brutal warden Ted de Corsia (as Ben Rickey) cracks down hard on inmates who don't follow the rules, tripling sentences and making sure troublemakers are either shot dead or smacked upside the head. He favors hard-edged discipline, but newly arrived captain David Brian (as Mark Benson) wants Folsom to try a more humane approach with the prisoners.

***SPOILERS*** Excellent behind bars or prison film narrated by Charles Lung, as the voice of Falsom Prison, on how brutal the US Prison System was at the turn of the 20th Century and how men of consciouses and humanity went as far as risking their careers as well as in some cases their live in order to correct it.Falsom Prison run by the take no BS and give no mercy warden Ben Ricky, Ted de Corsia, has become so untenable for the convicts sent there that they were more then willing to risk their lives, as well as take the lives of others,in making attempts to break out of it.

If you see the name Crane Wilbur in the credits, either as writer or director, especially if it is a crime picture, you can be sure that it will be above average. Wilbur used his skills as a veteran actor (going as far back as the silent Perils Of Pauline serial) as an author and later as a director to deepen the quality of the genre work he took on, often through research before shooting, so that the results had more unusual dialogue and a richness of realistic detail.

I was really very shocked...pleasantly shocked...

Here is a case where a cast of solid and interesting actors become the main reason to watch. INSIDE THE WALLS OF FOLSOM PRISON is not in the league of great prison movies like BRUTE FORCE (Dassin, 1947), but it has some singular qualities that will make fans of the prison movie genre want to seek it out.

With the exception of Steve Cochran who did do some leads Inside The Walls Of Folsom Prison is a film Warner Brothers did with a whole lot of their supporting players. Both as convicts and guards they tell a gritty tale about Folsom Prison the place where all the really bad apples in the California Penal System go.