Representing the culmination of a decade long collaboration between director Don Seigel and perpetual 1970's Clint Eastwood Escape from Alcatraz is a very loose account fo the 1962 escape from the legendary prison located in San Francisco Bay.
The film opens with Frank Morris (Eastwood) being delivered to his new island home. He meets the hard ass warden (Patrick McGoohan) and delivers the speech to Morris about no one ever escaping Alcatraz and no one ever will. The film then follows Morris and his compatriots (Jack Thibeau, Fred Ward, and Larry Hankin) use their wits and the materials they have on hand to make their daring escape.
Shot on the actual island, the film has a washed out and bleak look that obviously mimics its location in the foggy and cold bay area. The order in these broken down buildings shows how the island has rotted away with time, but the cogs of justice have continued to turn no matter what happens. Clint Eastwood's performance is one of his best, on par with Josey Wales or Unforgiven. You are not watching Dirty Harry in this film as Eastwood leaves that persona before the opening credits roll. The performances throughout the film are filled with hopelessness and even characters not involved in the escape seem to perk up when it's even hinted at. It's like sun light breaking through the clouds for one solitary moment.
As a whole, the theme of the film is hope. All of the convicts are hopeless until Frank shows up and starts filling their minds with the possibility, the hope, of escape. Could there be a way out of Alcatraz that doesn't end in death? This is another '70's film that flipped the good guys and the bad guys. Once again, after Vietnam and Watergate, the nation lost confidence in its authority figures. In Escape from Alcatraz you are rooting for the cons to overcome the authority that keeps pressing its thumb down on them from the opening moments. It is a great film that is really an underrated masterpiece of the 1970's.
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