SAN QUENTIN (1946)
iI watched this movie because it stars Lawrence Tierney, one of my favorite tough guys of that era (and an off-screen tough guy, too). Here he plays Jim Roland, a reformed bad guy--product of San Quentin's "League" of model prisoners who've earned parole. The benevolent warden wants him and a current supposed model prisoner, Nick Taylor (Barton Maclane, Eternal Heavy) to go to a newspaper to be interviewed about the League, but Taylor, using a hidden gun (natch!) shoots the warden and takes off on a one-man crime spree. Roland vows to bring him in, getting help from a network of League graduates on the streets, and earning the malevolent interest of a SF detective, who wants to put him back in prison. This is a simple B movie with a fairly interesting plot and decent action. Tierney's your basic one-note actor, but when used in bad guy/tough guy roles, he's quite effective and has excellent stage presence. Not a bad film at all.