Clint Eastwood has made so many classic films that the near-classics and the lesser-known titles on his resume become easily overlooked. Escape from Alcatraz is one such title.
The film does not achieve anything revolutionary with the prison film formula, but still wildly succeeds with its straightforwardness and uncompromising approach. Escape from Alcatraz is based on the true story of three men’s successful escape from the redoubtable penitentiary. This core authenticity provides power to the ongoings. Viewers are watching (more or less) what actually occurred— excusing some deviations and dramatizations.
Eastwood plays the mastermind behind the breakout, a bank robber/burglar, well versed in busting out of prisons across the country. Fed up with him, the U.S. government sends Eastwood to Alcatraz, a place known for its brutal inescapability. The film follows his interactions with the other inmates, his formulation of an escape plan, and his eventual enacting of that plan.
Eastwood’s character is highly intelligent and crafty. But he’s surrounded by equally unique and tragic companions. Roberts Blossom (Old Man Marley in Home Alone) plays an older convict with nothing left to live for but his paintings. Another prisoner keeps a pet mouse, whom he feeds bits of spaghetti to. Larry Hankin (a second Home Alone alum) portrays the timid next-door cell neighbor of Eastwood, who joins him in the breakout. Patrick McGoohan is requisite evil warden, a particularly sadistic one.
Escape from Alcatraz excites without reinventing or subverting genre conventions. The excitement comes from watching the characters slowly work out their escape plan. It is one of the reasons that audiences enjoy prison films — and heist films, for that matter: it is thrilling to see someone pull off the impossible, particularly when carried out with plausibility. The audience gets a vicarious rush from witnessing a character’s shrewdness and ability to think quickly on their feet when the inevitable roadblocks arise. We love watching intelligent and skillful people “at work”.
Though tautly constructed, some modern audiences might find the movie lumbering as it slowly develops its story and characters. But stick with it. The film is rewarding and clever, particularly its use of silence and visuals to provide information. If you have not watched Escape from Alcatraz, it is certainly one to check out.
I want to leave you with the scene that always sticks with me. In the prison workshop, a character has become so emotionally shattered by Alcatraz’s oppressiveness and the warden’s cruelty that out of desperation he picks up a hatchet and cuts off his own fingers. Eastwood being Eastwood, he calmly picks the fingers up and places them in a box for safe keeping.
-T.Z.
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