Up the River

Up the River (1930)

You bet ~ IT'S FUNNY a movietone laugh riot.

Daily life at men and women's prison units where baseball and the marching band are serious business. Two prisoners escape in order to help paroled Steve from being blackmailed by his girlfriend's ex-partner-in-crime.

Date of release
1930-10-10
TMDB
5.6 / 10 (33)
Runtime
1h 25m
Genres
Comedy, Crime
Director
John Ford

Casting

Interesting facts

Up the River is a 1930 American pre-Code comedy film directed by John Ford and starring Claire Luce as well as Spencer Tracy and Humphrey Bogart in their feature-film debuts and the only film in which the men appeared together. Fox remade the film in 1938 starring Preston Foster and Tony Martin.

Production

Up the River was produced in 1930 by Fox Film during John Ford's early sound period; it was reportedly conceived as a grim prison drama until MGM's The Big House prompted a reworking into a comedy, and Ford later credited William Collier Sr. with helping him rewrite the script.

The scenario was written by Maurine Dallas Watkins, the cinematography was by Joseph H. August, and the editing was by Frank E. Hull.

Ford foregrounds male camaraderie, structuring the plot around two veteran convicts who break out to help a friend and then return in time for a prison baseball game against a rival team.

The cast featured Spencer Tracy at the start of his screen career opposite Warren Hymer, with an early appearance by Humphrey Bogart in a “nice boy” role atypical of his later persona.

Upon release, Fox announced plans to continue Tracy and Hymer as a comedy team, but after a further teaming in Goldie (1931) the idea was abandoned.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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