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When I began watching "Against Her Will: An Incident in Baltimore", I was completely unaware that it was the second of three films with the same actors and characters. In 1990, the TV movie "The Incident" debuted and in 1994 "Incident in a Small Town" debuted. I know that these three films are currently posted to YouTube.

Harmon Cobb (Walter Matthau) and his daughter-in-law and granddaughter have just moved to Anne Arundel County in Maryland. This is because retired Judge Bell (Harry Morgan) has given Cobb a job at his legal practice. But Bell is odd in that he not only gives him a job but buys him a car and house....and apparently this generosity is related somehow to the previous movie...which I'll be seeing next.

At this law firm, Cobb is well paid but also a bit unhappy, as he doesn't have much to do and Judge Bell is too generous. In the midst of this, a man comes to Cobb and asks him for help. It seems his Greek girlfriend is stuck in a hellish Maryland state mental hospital. She checked herself in but cannot check herself out...and the hospital isn't being very cooperative.

I assume this is not based on any particular true case, though the story rings true in many ways. Back in the 1940s, some psychiatric facilities were indeed awful and did more harm than good. In essence, many were just dumping grounds for the unwanted. Now I am not attacking current psychiatric treatment, after all, I am a trained psychotherapist...but things were often quite bad back in the 'good old days'...and the film does a nice job of addressing this problem.

There's plenty more to the film, including a subplot involving the daughter-in-law, but the bottom line is that the film is well worth seeing due to the fine acting and lovely period look of this story. Well worth seeing...and it left me eager to see the other two movies.

A phenomenal movie with superb performances by Walter Matthau and Harry Morgan. Both would reprise their types of roles 2 years later in "An Incident in A Small Town."

While the latter film was also quite good, this one is even better because it exposes conditions in a mental institution in 1947's Baltimore. At the beginning, some of the harrowing scenes reminded me of Olivia De Havilland's memorable performance in 1948's "The Snake Pit."

Matthau, as a widowed attorney who has moved to Baltimore with his widowed daughter-in-law and granddaughter, takes on the case of a woman who committed herself to an asylum for depression and then was held there totally against her will. You will see plenty of corruption, abuse and other things that we unfortunately read in the papers about such institutions. You'll also see how this was a profitable business and the definite need for state intervention.

As if the picture isn't good enough, the sidebar story is where Susan Blakely, the daughter-in-law finds happiness with the 4-F math teacher in the town. This angers Matthau and he insults her in a memorable scene. The picture depicts the adjustment of finding a new life for the war widowed after World War 11.

The film is truly remarkable from beginning to end.

Walter Matthau delivers a stunning portrayal of a near defunct attorney who takes a desperate case. In this film, Matthau's character must gain the release of severely troubled patient of the "corrupt" state mental hospital of Maryland. With a performance such as this, many must wonder why Matthau settles for such poor roles on the big screen.

This is the second movie in the "Incident" trilogy starring Walter Matthau and Harry Morgan. It was not as good as the first one, but much better than the third. In this film, Judge Bell has gone into private practice in Baltimore and recruits Harmon Cobb to be his partner. The judge gives him a good salary, a house and a car, but no interesting cases.

Mr. Cobb discovers one, however, when a stranger in a diner follows him after he leaves and begs him to get a young woman out of a state mental hospital. (Mr. Cobb was telling lawyer jokes in the diner, so his occupation was obvious.) Judge Bell is against taking the case since the state will have to be sued, but his partner won't back down.

There are some very distressing scenes in the hospital, including what the young woman looks like, but it's still TV type distressing. While there are two evil money-making psychiatrists in the movie, there is one heroic one, too, trying to stop the abuse and lies. Barton Heyman gives a touching performance as an orderly in the mental hospital who had been there since he was three. The reason he was committed? He was a "feeble child".

While the case is going on, Harmon Cobb also has to deal with his daughter-in-law dating for the first time since her husband was killed in the war. (She and his granddaughter moved to Baltimore with him.) He is not doing a very good job dealing with the matter, because it's forcing him to deal with the death of his son. The regulars in these movies are all likable characters, and these movies are good when the script is good.

This is for against her Another installment of the incident series. A young girl is being used as a guinea pig at a psychiatric clinic against her will. Judge Bell is totally against helping her but Cobb puts his foot down. It takes a lot of work but Mr. Cobb finds the proof he needs to help this girl. James Welch Henderson Arkansas 4/29/21.