Escape from San Quentin (1957) User Reviews (4)

Nice low budget thriller!

[gordonl56 · 7/10 · 13 March 2012]

A better than expected low budget "Columbia Pictures" production from prolific director, Fred Sears.

A group of convicts from San Quentin Prison are sent to a work farm as a reward for good behaviour. Three of them decide to take advantage of the relaxed security and pull an escape.

The three are Johnny Desmond, Richard Devon and Roy Engel. Desmond wants to get back to L.A. because his wife sent him divorce papers. Devon wants to retrieve the 120 grand he has hidden from a robbery. Engel is a mobster who wants in on the 120 large.

Desmond, an ex-Air Force pilot, comes up with a plan to get them all away pronto like. They will break out, steal the work farm's truck and head for the small local airport. There, they will steal a light plane and fly to safety in Canada.

Once in Canada, Devon says he will have his father dig up the loot and send it to them.

The aircraft they steal however has only half the fuel they need. Devon and Desmond are forced to make an emergency landing on a bit of highway. Engel did not make the trip because Devon had pushed him out the door at takeoff. He had no intention of making a three way split of his cash.

The two hi-jack a car and head for L.A. Engel, somewhat bruised and banged up, has survived the toss out. He is of course slightly annoyed with this course of events and vows revenge. Since he knows where the other two are going, he heads off in pursuit.

Desmond and Devon hit L.A. and lay low in a low rent motel room supplied by Devon's buddy, William Bryant. Devon sends Bryant out to make contact with Devon's father, Ken Christy. He is to bring the cash to the motel hideout.

The Police have been keeping tabs on Devon's father, Ken Christy, since Devon's escape. Turns out that the Police are not the only one watching Christy. Engel has managed to get back to L.A. and has rounded up his old gang. They know Devon must contact the old man in order to get the loot.

Bryant delivers the message to Christy. Bryant then has the bad luck to be grabbed up by Engel and his boys. They would like to have little talk. A rather severe beating is applied and Bryant spills Desmond and Devon's location. They will simply park outside and wait for the old man to show.

While this is all going on, Desmond has gone looking for his soon to be ex. He runs into the sister in law, Merry Anders, instead. Anders tells him the place is lousy with John Law. Let her take a message to her sister. Desmond gives her his motel address and heads back.

The ex wants nothing to do with Desmond and tells Anders she'll call the Police if Desmond shows his face. Anders hits the motel to give Desmond the news.

At the same time Devon's father appears with a paper bag of cash. It is only 14 grand though. The rest is hidden in various places around L.A. It was all Christy could grab in a hurry.

The door is now kicked in and Engel and one of his gunmen rush in towing a battered Bryant. They grab up the bag and head back out not knowing it is short 100 grand. As Engel and company jump into their car a passing prowl car sees their guns. A chase starts and a shotgun blast hits the getaway car. Up goes Engel, the gunman, and the bag of money as the car explodes.

Devon Desmond, Christy, Anders and the bleeding Bryant pile into their car and beat a hasty retreat.

They decide to head for Mexico to hide out. They drop off Christy to gather the rest of the cash. He can meet them at a hotel in Mexico Devon knows.

Devon "insists", Anders come along as she can identify him. As for Bryant, Devon knows a Mexican doc who will fix him up. They make it over to Tijuana and grab a room.

Everything with the plan now starts to goes wrong as the doc wants his cash up front. Devon fixes the Bryant problem by dropping him several floors down a disused elevator shaft. Then Christy calls with more bad news, they need to come back to the States in order to get the cash.

Without giving away the actual ending, suffice it say there is a bout or two of flying fists and a gun battle with the Police, before the nasty types are caught.

Though put together on an obvious shoestring budget, director Sears gets the most out of cast and crew.

Director Sears managed to crank out 54 titles between 1949 and his death in 1957. These include, RUMBLE ON THE DOCKS, Miami EXPOSE, CHICAGO SYNDICATE, CELL 2455:DEATH ROW, THE 49th MAN, and two great sci-fi classics, THE GIANT CLAW and EARTH VS THE FLYING SAUCERS.

The screenplay was by Bernard Gordon. He worked on several noir like, THE CASE AGAINST BROOKLYN, CRIMEWAVE, CHICAGO CONFIDENIAL and FLESH AND FURY.

The D of P was Ben H. Kline. His work included, ROSES ARE RED, HALF PAST MIDNIGHT, THE JUDGE, TREASURE OF MONTE CRISTO, STRANGE ILLUSION, DEADLINE FOR MURDER, SHOOT TO KILL, JEWELS OF BRANDENBURG, THE CRIMSON KEY, THE INVISIBLE WALL and of course, DETOUR. (b/w)

Fast Moving Low Budget Film Noire!

[bsmith5552 · 6/10 · 1 July 2017]

"Escape From San Quentin" is a fast moving low budgeted little film noire about a daring escape of three prisoners from the famed prison.

Mike Gilbert (Johnny Desmond), Roy Gruber (Richard Devon) and Hap Graham (Roy Engel) have been model prisoners at San Quentin's main prison. As a result, they are transferred to a low security facility where they have greater freedom. Gilbert is a former fighter pilot and Gruber tries to get him to go in with him in stealing a plane from a nearby airfield, on the premise that he has $119k stashed with his father in Los Angeles. When he receives notice that his wife is divorcing him, Gilbert reluctantly agrees to the escape. Graham muscles his way into the break but is left behind as Gilbert and Gruber take off.

Gilbert and Gruber arrive safely in L.A. and hide out in a seedy motel. Unbeknownst to them is the fact that Hap Graham has also made it to town and is out for revenge and the $119k prize. Graham has his men stake out Curley Gruber's (Ken Christy) garage with a view to trapping Gruber when he comes for his money.

Meanwhile Mike Gilbert tries through his wife's sister Robbie (Merry Anders) to meet with his estranged wife without success. Ritchie (William Bryant) a friend of Gruber's aides the pair. Mike unwittingly draws Robbie into the foray. Then Hap Graham confronts Gruber and Gilbert and.................................................

Columbia Pictures was churning out a series of "bottom half of the double bill" little features at this time. Most were entertaining and were a good bet to be teamed up with one of the studio's 80 minute color westerns of the day, usually starring George Montgomery. Johnny Desmond was a popular singer/songwriter of the day who made a couple of movies and many TV appearances. Richard Devon was one of those "whatshisnames" who would go on to a lengthy career in both movies and TV.

Just as an aside, two of my favorite "B" movie actors, Tristram Coffin and Dennis Moore appear in one short scene as cops but have no connection to any of the other characters in the story. They're just dropped in, perhaps to lengthen the running time. Who knows?

Escape ain't worth the try....finish your sentence!

[mark.waltz · 5/10 · 26 September 2014]

Yes, there have been successful prison escapes, but this one seems doomed at the start. Singing Johnny Desmond has refused to aid old pal Richard Devon in an attempt escape, but Devon needs Johnny, a former pilot, to fly the plane which is located on an airfield right next to the San Quentin prison farm they are working in. Devon uses that old bait (alcohol) to get Desmond to agree to his plan, guessing even a drunken pilot is better than no pilot at all. The poor older prisoner who wants to join in on the escape gets the brunt of Devon's violent behavior when trying to escape with him, and later, after landing on a highway to avoid the cops waiting for them at a local airport, Devon kills a kindly old man who stopped to help them. The film just proceeds to get more and more violent, ending up, first in Los Angeles, and later in Mexico, and culminating in a motel room just outside of Oceanside.

Gripping, if somewhat unbelievable, this still grabs you and never lets go. Somehow, Peggy Maley, the blonde actress playing Desmond's bitter estranged wife isn't billed anywhere on the IMDb for this film, but the second billed Merry Anders (as Desmond's sister-in-law) is, and provides chilling reminders of how the innocent are sometimes manipulated into situations beyond their control and how one mistake in somebody's life can almost end up costing them their life. This is an above average prison/crime drama with a cast of mostly unknowns who help make this a plane ride to hell with the help of a few automobiles on the way. Just too bad the train ride was missing to complete the threesome.

Crime B-Movie With Everything

[TheFearmakers · 10/10 · 2 January 2024]

More a legit film noir than the b-crime programmer it seems despite the action-faring, plot-describing title, which can mislead viewers into thinking ESCAPE FROM SAN QUENTIN centers more on high octane breakout bedlam than dialogue-driven suspense with a side dish of gun-wielding intrigue since all the usual hackneyed prison devices are absent, including makeshift underground tunnels, irritable guards, a Fascist warden and convicts tapping messages on the walls...

Instead, the rudimentary setting is a work farm not a prison; and it's one man's occupation, or in this case, previous skill that makes real life crooner Johnny Desmond a lucrative player for his hardened convict and cellmate "buddy" Richard Devon, whose tough lifer character, Roy, unlike Johnny's Mike who has only two years left, goads him into flying a small plane to freedom in what's ultimately a much too simple escape, especially for the movie to be named after: the duo headed to the same town where Roy buried a bag of loot...

The good guy's no-good wife, who wants nothing to do with her convict husband, has a younger sister in Merry Anders' girl-next-door, Robbie, with a lifelong crush on her brother-in-law. She alone turns out being used and abused by the film's progressively desperate and vile heavy, Devon's Roy, in order to keep his sidekick from ratting out and ruining the whole plan: One that entails far more than picking up a load of hidden cash -- surrounded by a group of backstabbing thugs, Roy didn't steal that money by himself, but he alone buried it...

Eventually there are far too many cooks here, making ESCAPE a proverbial crowded room in an otherwise vacant house: Merry Andrews is pretty and vulnerable while Johnny Desmond (singing just one tune while lounging in prison) has an easygoing and laidback aura; that is, until the end when his eyes bug out and he channels old Warner Bros gangster flicks, and he does a good job except that the movie's almost finished...

But it's his vicious cellmate, Devon, and overall orchestrator, in over his head with the assembly of even more 11th hour goons, who not only carries the picture but is the only person carried by the plot he's responsible for. Plus, his anti-chemistry with our token distressed-damsel far exceeds her more brotherly than romantic connection with the hero...

And despite spending more time outside the work farm than inside, Fred F. Sears' ESCAPE FROM SAN QUENTIN has a great first act behind bars, with terrific devil-temping dialogue between good convict and bad... feeling like a short movie in itself: one that truly stars buried lead/stock heavy Richard Devon, the only character who really needs something and who returns in another B-Picture -- directed by Roger Corman titled WAR OF THE SATELLITES.