Girls in Chains

Back in the 1930s and 40s, there were quite a few so-called 'poverty row studios'. These were small outfits with very small budgets...so small that they didn't even own studio space. Instead, they usually rented space in other studios at night...filming when the big studios were sound asleep. Many of these tiny outfits made lousy films...and perhaps the most consistently lousy was PRC (Producers Releasing Corporation). Sure, occasionally they made a decent film...but they seemed to be pretty much by accident! So, when I noticed that "Girls in Chains" was from PRC, I pretty much assumed it would be crap.

The story begins with sleazy gangter Johnny Moon murdering someone. In the next scene, he's in court for some murder--perhaps that one at the beginning or some other. Regardless, the jury finds him not guilty...and the judge lectures them about what horrible folks they are and he's baffled at how they could have said the man wasn't guilty despite overwhelming evidence.

In an odd plot twist, in the next scene, Johnny Moon's sister-in-law is fired because of her association with Johnny--though she hates who he is and what he stands for. Here's the odd part--some reformers help her get a job at the local women's prison, as they like her attitude and the place is desperate need of reform. Once there, she sees that the staff are indifferent towards the fates of the inmates...and the Warden is essentially employed by Johnny Moon! Can anything be done to clean up this festering mess?? And, will the women of this prison trust their new teacher or is she just like the rest? And why would a crook like Moon WANT to see the prisoners mistreated? Wouldn't he want them treated like princesses instead?!

According to IMDB, this film was shot in only five days--so there wasn't much room for re-shoots and making it a high quality product. Yet, despite this, the movie isn't nearly as bad as I expected. Now I am NOT saying it's great...but it sure looks better than a five-day film. And, its score of 4 is practically an Oscar win for PRC!!



By the way, the tough inmate who is first befriended by the teacher is played by Barbara Pepper. Pepper is better known as the lady who played the first Mrs. Zipfel on "Green Acres". Yes, that would make her Arnold's mom! And, Johnny's right hand man is played by Sid Melton...who played Al Monroe on the same show!

I'd never heard of this movie by the master of Poverty Row, Edgar G. Ulmer. The title is what drew me to it.

It's a hodgepodge of plot and subplot. It is far, far from his weird best. Music is used but not the classical music he often employed.

However, it's fun. The main character is the sister of a gangster's wife. She loses her job teaching school because of this. Not to worry, though! She has a Masters Degree in psychology.

Now, when Joyce Brothers appeared on the scene with a doctoral degree a decade later, it was a novelty. How rare this must have been in the early 1940s. (My grandmother, Smith College class of 1921, had an advanced degree and was a career gal; but she was unusual. And that was in the 1950s and sixties.)

What makes the character even more peculiar is her hairdo. Yikes! Ms. Judge sports what looks like a nest of some sort on her scalp. The women in the 1960s with bouffants had nothing on her. Furthermore, she frequently tops this with a hat. And on top of that (literally and figuratively) the hats sometimes have veils! When she gives up teaching she ends up at a women's prison. The rest is fairly routine. But it has the touch, albeit nearly imperceptible, of a master.

Girls in Chains (1943)

1/2 (out of 4)

Incredibly bad drama from PRC has a school teacher (Arline Judge) being fired from her job because her sister is dating a gangster. The teacher then gets a job in a home for delinquent girls where she tries to clean up the abuse, which might lead back to the gangster. This is an incredibly bad film that really goes beyond badness on all levels. Orgy of the Dead still gets my vote for the worst film ever made but this one here takes the honor for the worst performances I've ever seen. I really never thought acting could get as bad as it does here but the only reason I don't give this thing a BOMB is because of the bad acting, which leads to several laughs throughout the film. I've never really understood all the praise thrown at Ulmer, although I'm a big fan of a couple of his films. His direction here is decent at best but why in the hell didn't he try and get better actors? Yes, this is an ultra-low-budget flick but I've never seen acting this bad. The editing is also quite terrible but that's to be expected. If you're a fan of really bad movies then you might get a few laughs out of this thing but others should stay far away.

This monstrosity should settle for once and for all that Edgar Ulmer is not the continental wunderkind that Peter Bogdanavich held him to be, (a view, incidentally, that Ulmer did all he could to promote.) True, in "Strange Illusion,"and "Detour," Ulmer delivered films with suspense and pacing, whilst in "Bluebeard," he delivered a fairly convincing 19th century atmosphere, (heavily influenced by German expressionism but under-cut by the film's supporting actresses who sound like Bronx stenographers rather than Parisian coquettes.)

The "Black Cat" deserves separate treatment inasmuch as it manages disturbing aesthetical accomplishments of an altogether singular, (if morally dubious) order.

But such accomplishments do not extend to the whole of his work, and most of the time, (until at least his allegedly two best films--"Club Havana," and "Her Sisters Secret," again become extant) we must confront the fact that Ulmer may as well be Jean Yarborough, or Lew Landers, or Sam Newfield or Tommy Carr, which is to say he turned out PRC dreck utterly without distinction.

"Girls in Chains" is an excellent case in point. Unless one counts the shadowy rooftop chase finale, (which pre-figures "Bluebeard") this picture is risible in its ineptitude.

Where to begin? The plot? (and since Ulmer is one of the writers he shares the blame): the matron, (Arline Judge) of a woman's correctional institution is thwarted in her attempts at prison reform by a corrupt warden and his mafia cronies.

There are shades of Irene Dunne's earlier "Ann Vickers" in this, but this treatment is so pulpy that it's a pity the "Carol Burnett Show" never got ahold of it. Ulmer's alleged literary fixations here betoken a fondness for "The Police Gazette" rather than Faust.

While we're at it--be sure and note the musical score too. This is stock music utterly unsuited to the characters or situations it underpins--frequently to hilarious results. Thus, gangster, con man extrordinaire, "Johnny Moon"'s scenes are underscored by a syrupy rendition of "When Johnny Comes Marching Home" !!! Are we, the audience, supposed to feel patriotic and sentimental at knowing this murderer has been freed from prison by a corrupt jury, that he has "come marching home again" to yet kill again?

Then too, since Mr. Ulmer is noted for his oversight of art direction--well exactly what happened here?! The inside of Miss Judge's office looks like several forgotten flats pushed to the edge of the sound stage, waiting to be dressed. Couldn't someone have hung a picture on the picture hook that hangs so visibly above the lamp behind her? True, the flat of gangster Johnny Moon, and a nightspot known as the "Rendevous" do show traces of down-market PRC swank, but elsewhere the picture is visually starved.

The characterization is similarly absurd--strictly by the books gangster clichés--the only thing missing is the name "Mugsy".

Case in point: an elderly alcoholic who stumbles in and out of the story, (for comedy relief purposes--of which he affords neither) who is eventually tossed into a dam! (that looks like stock footage of the Tennessee Valley Authority).

As the lead, Miss Judge appears to be operating on about 100 mg. of Valium during most of her scenes, (and who can blame her--since she has read the script and is probably thinking, "...If only I were still under contract to Fox...".

Earlier posters, however, reveal their ignorance of World War II coiffures in their gibes at her hairdo. Miss Judge's up-sweep was all the rage at the time, and, in fact, many other actresses wore modified versions of the same style.

"Girls in Chains" is for connoisseurs of perfectly dreadful films. Rest assured that Mr. Ulmer did us no favors with this one.

Arline Judge and Roger Clark head a no name cast in this Grade B flick about a woman's prison. This one ought to be seen back to back with Caged to note the difference between what an A film and a B film treatment of the same subject. I'm not sure I should dignify Girls in Chains by calling it a B film. By the way, I didn't see one chain during this entire turgid drama.

Ms. Judge is a psychologist and sister-in-law of the town's leading racketeer who gets a job despite that at a woman's prison. Roger Clark is a cop now working the juvenile beat. Together they bring down the political machine that controls the town and the women's prison which is just a patronage trough.

The film is badly edited and the story makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. Clark and Judge offered no competition to Tracy and Hepburn as a screen team. Best performance in the film is that of Emmett Lynn who played old codgers in westerns mostly. Here he does a great drunk act and actually plays the key role in bringing the villains to justice.

Probably the best known player in this is Sid Melton, later on better known as Ichabod Mudd with two 'd's, sidekick to Captain Midnight. He's the sidekick to the racketeer here. Captain Midnight was Shakespeare next to Girls in Chains.