MOVIES
Six Powerful Prison Films Compared
“I guess it comes down to a simple choice, really. Get busy living, or get busy dying.” — Andy Dufresne, Shawshank Redemption
I’ve long been a fan of Cool Hand Luke, the epic prison film starring Paul Newman and George Kennedy. Like all great films, there are memorable scenes and memorable lines, including this one by the prison captain: “What we’ve got here is… failure to communicate.”
Paul Newman is Luke Jackson, who ends up with a two year sentence for a meaningless crime. His story becomes a metaphor for the existential hero who refuses to accept things as they are and is inwardly determined to be free from the constraints of existence. I’ve watched the film several times over the years and find it to be the perfect expression of existential philosophy, which was very much in vogue in the decades after WW2.
With this film as a gold standard of prison films, here are several more flicks to add to the Prison Films canon.
Cell Block 19 (1954)
I only discovered this movie by accident and what a nice surprise. Unlike the rest of the movies here, it is not centered around movie stars but rather a gritty story about a prison riot. When COVID-19 resulted…
