Big House U.S.A. (1955)

In a Colorado national park, a young boy (Peter J. Votrian) is kidnapped and his kidnapper (Ralph Meeker) extorts $200,000 from the boy's father (Willis Bouchey). The father pays the ransom but when the kidnapper is caught, he refuses to say what happened to the boy (we never see him again) or where the money is hidden. He's sent to prison which he finds more of a danger than the outside world. Directed by Howard W. Koch (GIRL IN BLACK STOCKINGS), this is one of those little B movies that turn out to be a nifty noir-ish thriller. I was expecting the usual prison movie with all the cliches but this intense programmer has a lot going for it. Shot mostly on location rather than a studio, it's filmed in a semi documentary style with Reed Hadley narrating as an FBI agent on the case. It's a brutal film by 1950s standards (children killed, heads bashed in, bodies burned etc.) and Broderick Crawford as one cold hearted bastard that kills you after you've served your purpose. There's a fine supporting cast: Charles Bronson (who spends the entire movie with his shirt off), Felicia Farr whose nurse seems an unimportant character at first but turns out to be very important to the plot, William Talman, Lon Chaney Jr. and Roy Roberts.