Six of my convicts

A movie that I had never seen, although I think I had recognized the title from a showing on TCM ages back, is My Six Convicts. I noticed that it was available to watch on Tubi, so I finally got around to watching it. I also saw that it's one of the movies that's leaving Tubi soon, specifically at the end of September, so I'm moving up when I'm doing a post on it to give everybody a day or two to catch it before it leaves, since I don't know that it's on any of the other services.

Stanly Kramer's company produced this one early in his career, so you can expect that he's got some social issues he wants to explore, and with the title My Six Convicts you can guess that it has to do with the inside of a prison. Specifically, John Beal plays Doc, one of those reformer type pyschologists who wants to come up with better conditions for the prisoners and hopefully be able to rehabilitate them, at least in part. There's a new political administration, and they think prison reform is a good idea, so Doc gets sent into one of the prisons.

The first thing wants to do is come up with mental assessments of all the convicts, but that's going to be difficult since there's only one of him and a thousand or more prisoners. The prison physician suggests Doc get a staff from among some of the prisoners, but that's going to be dificult, since nobody realy wants to trust in any of the staff lest the prisoners get thought of as stoolies. And indeed, the first time Doc tries to administer one of the standardized tests, there's nearly a riot.

But Doc keeps working and eventually finds a convict in Connie (Millard Mitchell) who is willing to help. Connie is a safecracker, and one who has a pretty darn high level of intelligence. Two others, embezzler Kopac (Jay Adler), who can't stay out of prison in part becaue he doesn't know anything else in life any longer; and Punch Pinero (Gilbert Roland), a gangster who expects to be deported after his sentence; soon follow. After that, another three (Harry Morgan as a psychopathic killer, Alf Kjellin, and Marshall Thompson) join in to complete the titular six convicts.

In some ways, I found myself thinking of Gideon's Day/Gideon of Scotland Yard as it seems like there's not a lot going on or it's an episodic movie. But at the same time, My Six Convicts is a surprisingly effective little ensemble movie. I do wonder how realistic it is although it is autobiographical.

Take the chance to watch My Six Convicts now; I don't know when it's going to show up again.