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the audience applauded

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

My review does contain a spoiler.If a man broke out of prison by striking a guard and risking the lives of others, wouldn't he be tried for that infraction when caught even if he was found to be innocent of the original crime? I think a better and more credible scenario would be for the main character to be inadvertently set free by some accidents in the prison such as a fire or storm or a train wreck during as prison transfer...A number of prisoners broke free in the accident so the police would be looking for quite a few escapees and not just one man, making it a bit easier for Ingram to get through. Also, later on he would not be in trouble for planning and initiating the escape and attacking a guard.

Edward G. Robinson departs from his more notorious bad-guy roles to play the wronged man in BLACKMAIL, a film that is something of a distant relative of what would come to be THE FUGITIVE which would star Harrison Ford more than sixty years later.John Ingram is a man who is trying to support his wife (played by Ruth Hussey right before her second-tier stardom) until his past comes in the form of William Rainey (Gene Lockhart) who not only is aware of Ingram's past in a chain-gang from which he escaped, but was also the man responsible for getting him there in the first place. He comes with a proposal to "clear Ingram's name" but this in turn lands Ingram back in the chain-gang with one motive: escape and revenge.A simple story, one which never tries to go beyond it's apparent B-movie status despite the actors involved in it, BLACKMAIL does not seem like an MGM product but more Warner Bros. The sparse scenes, the unglamorous vibe throughout, the grittiness that pervades throughout add to its credence. Though some plot inconsistencies are present, it's a quick moving story and gets to the point pretty fast without asking too much analysis.

Tough guy Edward G. Robinson, who normally dominates every movie he's in, is upstaged in this one, a good, unambitious actioner, first by raging oil well fires, then by the sly performance of Gene Lockhart, as a particularly loathsome, scheming villain, complete with a baby talking Down East accent. The movie is otherwise unexceptional though very skillfully made at MGM, and features an innocent Robinson on the run from the law for a crime he did not commit. As his sidekick, Guinn Williams is presented as so moronic one wonders how he can hold down any job, much less function as E.G.'s second in command in such a dangerous profession as putting out oil well fires, but the ways of Hollywood are sometimes mysterious. The capable Ruth Hussey is wasted in the boring and irritating role of the wife, from whom we want the movie to get away as quickly as possible. Robinson at first seems out of place in the Oklahoma oil fields but is so robust as the hard-driving entrepeneur hero that this is easily forgiven, and besides, he always excelled at playing fearless men.

Poor title for what is a movie patterned on "I Was A Fugitive From A Chain Gang." It would appear that some of the shots were either taken from that masterpiece or re-done virtually identically with new cast. Edward G. Robinson is presented in the Paul Muni role but this time the hero has been willfully framed -- not wrongfully convicted. This framing is necessary for the rest of the story line and the plot unfolds as believable. Gene Lockhart steals the show in his portrayal of the villain. Robinson never looks as gaunt as Muni and is less convincing as someone who has suffered on the chain gang. Watching Robinson's rotund body run through the swamps just doesn't hack it. If given a choice, see the Muni movie but this one will serve for those who prefer a different ending. A better title might have been "Vengeance."