Eleanor Parker

Agnes Moorehead

Ellen Corby

Hope Emerson

Betty Garde

Jan Sterling

Lee Patrick

Olive Deering

Jane Darwell

Gertrude Michael

Sheila MacRae

Gertrude Astor

George Baxter

Guy Beach

Don Beddoe

Gail Bonney

Lovyss Bradley

Ralph Brooks

Jean Calhoun

Claudia Cauldwell

Pauline Creasman

Marjorie Crossland

Jane Crowley

Evelyn Dockson

Pauline Drake

Marlo Dwyer

Helen Eby-Rock

Virginia Engels

Barbara Esback

Edith Evanson

Helen Gereghty

Grayce Hampton

Grace Hayes

Frances Henderson

Gertrude Hoffmann

Taylor Holmes

Esther Howard

Bill Hunter

Hazel Keener

Doris Kemper

Ann Kunde

Margaret Lambert

Gracille LaVinder

Marie Melesh

Tina Menard

Charles Meredith

Joan Miller

Frances Morris

Helen Mowery

Zon Murray

Eva Nelson

Joyce Newhard

Rosemary O'Neil

Ezelle Poule

Yvonne Rob

Naomi Robison

Carole Shannon

Lynn Sherman

Queenie Smith

Helen Spring

Eileen Stevens

Amzie Strickland

Sheila Stuart

Nita Talbot

Wanda Tynan

Ann Tyrrell

Gladys Varden

Glen Walters

Harlan Warde

June Whipple

Doris Whitney

Marjorie Wood

Peggy Wynne

Perc Westmore

Murray Cutter

Stanley Jones

Jerry Wald

Max Steiner

Owen Marks

John Cromwell

Carl E. Guthrie

G.W. Berntsen

Charles H. Clarke

Virginia Kellogg

Bernard C. Schoenfeld

Frank Mattison

Ed Voight

Vic Johnson

Leah Rhodes

Louis Jennings

Myrl Stoltz

Jean Baker

Herschel Brown

Crime

Drama

Caged

Warner Bros. Pictures

Warner Bros. First National

United States of America

Prisoner 93850

Caged is directed by John Cromwell and adapted by Virginia Kellogg from her own story Women Without men that was co-written with Bernard C. Schoenfeld. It stars Eleanor Parker, Agnes Moorehead, Ellen Corby, Betty Garde and Hope Emerson. Music is by Max Steiner and cinematography by Carl E. Guthrie.

Teenager Marie Allen (Parker) is sent to a women’s prison after being found guilty of being an accomplice in a robbery, a robbery that saw her husband killed. She’s also pregnant and will have to have the child in the prison. Struggling to come to terms with her incarceration and the tough regime overseen by brutish warden Harper (Emerson), Marie comes to realise that she may have to go through a major character transformation to survive.

Unfairly tagged as camp and sounding on synopsis like what would become a cheese laden staple of women’s prison movies, Caged is actually rather powerful film making. The deconstruction and subsequent transformation of a young woman who clearly doesn’t belong behind those walls, is bleakly told. The prison is a foreboding place, the lady character’s reactions to their surroundings and way of life are emotionally charged.

Frank in its portrayal of prison life back then, but sly with its insinuations of sexual proclivities and criminal doings on the inside, the writing has a crafty edge most befitting the sombre tone that pervades the picture. Parker leads off the list of great performances to bring the drama to life, and with Guthrie’s black and white photography superbly emphasising claustrophobia and pungent emotional turmoil, it rounds out as a thoroughly gripping piece of film. With an ending that’s appropriately biting as well. 7.5/10

English

Caged (1950) Original Trailer [HD]

Caged Original Theatrical Trailer - Warner Archive Collection