Welcome to Mildly Pleased’s 8th Annual Criterion Month! Yet again, Sean, Colin, and I will be reviewing stuffy, artsy, and probably long movies from the Criterion Collection for a whole month. So put down those sunglasses, drop that surfboard, and dim the lights—for cinematic purposes (not romantic). Pop some corn and join us for a journey into the world of le cinéma (the cinema).
Today we have Riot in Cell Block 11, a gritty prison drama from tough-guy auteur Don Siegel (Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Dirty Harry). I’m a big fan of prison movies, and Siegel himself actually directed another one of my favorites, Escape from Alcatraz, 25 years later. So this was a no-brainer.
The film opens with newsreel footage accompanied by a narrator warning the viewer of the rise in prison riots across America. “Where will the next riot occur!” the narrator exclaims. What’s the name of this movie again? Right. But when? The first 13 minutes of the film? Damn, I wasn’t expecting that.
Riot in Cell Block 11 is populated by a collection of colorful character actors. There’s the Colonel (Robert Osterloh), a former decorated war vet; Mac (Joe Kerr), an accountant turned bank robber; and “Crazy” Mike Carnie (Leo Gordon), to name a few. There’s also the inmate’s grizzled leader, James V. Dunn, played by tough-guy cowboy actor Neville Brand in his best role. Though I am partial to Brand as the scythe-swinging hotel owner, Judd, in Tobe Hooper’s 1976 horror cult classic Eaten Alive. Still waiting on a Criterion disc for that one.
Going in, I thought this film might be about a group of inmates planning a riot, maybe as a diversion to escape the prison, but the plot of Riot in Cell Block 11 is more nuanced. Dunn and the inmates start a riot early in the film, taking guards as hostages to make a deal for better prison conditions. So the film is much more of a dramatic back-and-forth between Dunn and the Warden (Emile Meyer).
Tensions arise from within the prison populace as a power struggle for control of Cell Block 11 emerges. Inmates argue over what demands to make and how to obtain them. Do they kill the guards? Spare them? And it’s not any cleaner on the side of the law as politicians argue over what concessions to make, if any at all.
The bulk of the film’s brisk 80-minute runtime is devoted to both sides bickering over the dilemma, with the occasional fistfight thrown in for good measure. The use of newsreel footage and Dunn being interviewed by the media give the film a grounded, almost pseudo-docudrama feel. I imagine it’s those touches that land a film like this in the Criterion Collection.
I was also surprised to see such an enlightened take on the cruelty of the industrial prison complex in a film from 1954. What I wasn’t surprised by is that, even in a Hays Code-era movie where “the law” are the bad guys, the law will always prevail.
SPOILER: I’ll spare the details, but more or less, the inmates believe they have cut a deal with the governor only to find out weeks after the riot that the state has overturned the governor’s signature and that Dunn may have to serve additional time for inciting the riots. There’s a silver lining, though, when Dunn is informed some prisoners will be paroled and the prison’s mentally ill inmates will be sent to safer mental health facilities. There’s also the fact that the news story of the riot may lead to changes in the U.S. prison system, just not for Dunn.
Now that I’ve seen Riot in Cell Block 11, where does it land in my personal prison-movie hierarchy? Here’s my list as of 08/1/24. Keep in mind we all have our own definition of what makes a prison movie, and there’s still a lot I have yet to see. Here’s my top ten so far:
10. Stalag 17
9. Riot in Cell Block 11
8. Brawl in Cell Block 99
7. Cool Hand Luke
6. Papillon
5. Escape from Alcatraz
4. Midnight Express
3. The Shawshank Redemption
2. The Green Mile
1. The Great Escape
So Riot in Cell Block 11 does land a spot on my list just below a film clearly inspired by it. Criterion Month is off to a good start.