Chain Gang

After a chain gang riot ends up killing three prisoners, up-and-coming journalist Cliff Roberts (Douglas Kennedy, Dark Passage) goes undercover as a prison guard to prove the unlawful conditions the prisoners are forced to endure. Carrying a camera hidden in a lighter, Roberts is able to show the decrepit situation from the inside. But when the other guards become wise to Roberts, they have their own plans. CHAIN GANG is a gritty, unvarnished look at prison life and the cruelty bestowed upon its prisoners. Newly remastered.

Columbia's CHAIN GANG combines biting social commentary with good old-fashioned melodrama. Reporter Cliff Roberts (Douglas Kennedy) intends to expose political corruption by posing as a convict and joining a prison chain gang. While a "guest of the state," Roberts gets the lowdown on how cheap convict labor is being brutally exploited by certain higher-ups. Unfortunately, his ruse is discovered, and soon Roberts is desperately clambering through treacherous hills and dismal swamps, with police bloodhounds hot on his trail. Producer Sam Katzman claimed that CHAIN GANG was "torn from today's headlines," but he was always saying things like that.