THE LAST MILE
US, 1932, 75 minutes, Black and white.
Howard Phillips, Preston Foster, George E.Stone, Noel Maddison, Alan Roscoe, Paul Fix, Daniel L.Haynes, Edward Van Sloan, Louise Carter, Alec B. Francis.
Directed by Sam Bischoff.
The Last Mile is based on a play by John Wexley. Spencer Tracy played the central role of Killer Mears on Broadway and Clark Gable played it on tour. Howard Phillips who plays Walter also appeared on stage. This screen adaptation relies on words, the impact of dialogue. The action is confined to the death cells of the prison, courtroom scenes, and in hospital. Some flashbacks are inserted to the home of the condemned man, to the garage where he worked, an attempted robbery and the death of his partner. There is also a car chase, early 1930s style.
The film opens with serious words about imprisonment, capital punishment, words from the governor of Sing Sing, not making moral judgements about the guilt or innocence of the prisoners but asking whether a murderer should be punished by being murdered by the state. Prison films were very popular in the 1930s with quite a number of raising questions about capital punishment.
Howard Phillips, who appeared on the stage in his role of Water, is the young man condemned to death – the audience not knowing at first whether he is innocent or guilty but a flashback showing how he was a victim of circumstances. Preston Foster is very strong as Killer Mears, brash in his statements, clashing with the guards, trying to support Walter, ignoring the prison chaplain and arguing with him, ultimately giving his life for Walter.
The music in the film is interesting, Schubert’s Ave Maria being played over the words of the governor, Daniel L. Haynes, an African- American actor, singing with a strong Paul Robeson-like baritone, and a condemned prisoner with the lyrics of My Blue Heaven as he goes to his death.
Lyrics for the song include: All God's children got shoes, Walk all over God's Heaven. And he notes: There are two Heavens, one for whites and one for blacks; heaven for blacks is near the garbage. Segregation in Heaven.
There is religious background to the film, a Rabbi visiting the first condemned man, praying the Psalms, praying in Hebrew. Walter has a Catholic background with Fr O’Connor? visiting him, praying with him, being put in the cell when Killer Mears starts a jailbreak, arguing with Mears about prayer, faith, but finally persuading him to help the wounded Walter.
The film was remade in 1959 by Howard Koch with Mickey Rooney as Killer Mears and Frank Overton as Father O’ Connor.
The title card reads:
"The Last Mile" is more than a story of prison and of the condemned. To me it is a story of those men within barred cells, crushed mentally, physically and spiritually between unrelenting forces of man-made laws and man-fixed death. And justly or unjustly found guilty, are they not the victims of man's imperfect conventions, upon which he has erected a social structure of doubtful security? What is society's responsibility for ever-increasing murders? What shall be done with the murderers? "The Last Mile" does not pretend to give an answer. Society must find its own solution. But murder on the heels of murder is *not* that solution. - Lewis E. Lawes, Warden, Sing Sing Prison, Ossining, New York
1. Prison? Prisoners? Warden and guards? Capital punishment?
2. The film based on a play, most of the action in the death cells, the warden’s office, the court? Opened out for flashbacks, Walter’s home, the garage, the car chase and crash? The musical score?
3. The title, the focus on executions, the walk from the cells to the execution?
4. The opening, the words from the Governor of Sing Sing, not wanting to make judgements, questioning imprisonment, questioning the murder of a criminal even if the criminal was a murderer? The film and its stance on capital punishment?
5. The introduction to Walter, in the court, condemned, his mother’s outburst, going to prison, in the death cells, the prisoners and their being known by numbers, the introduction, the explanation of the different personalities, the focus on Killer Mears? Audiences not knowing whether Walter was innocent or guilty?
6. The personalities of the guards, sadistic, uncaring, spurning the criminals, taunting them? The stands of the warden, sympathies, doing his duty? His assistants?
7. The personalities of the different prisoners, the man who was going mad, screaming out, poetic? The man with the stay? Jackson, black, the impact of his singing? The man to be executed, his words, story, fears, being taken out, farewelling everyone?
8. Race issues in the early 1930s, the character of Jackson, the long discussion about whether Jackson would be in a quite heaven or a black heaven as well as the speculation about whether there was a black hell?
9. Mears, next to Walter, tough stances, yet encouraging? Antagonism towards the guards? Antagonism towards Father O’Connor? His encouragement of Walter, taking the guard’s gun, organising the breakout, the keys, the priest and the guards in the cell? Contact with the warden? Shooting, hostages, killing the guard in cold blood? The guns, shooting outside? The explosion on the cell walls? The deaths? His demands for a car for escape? His long speeches and explanations in his demands of treatment of others? Walter being shot, the priest making the plea, the news of the pardon, Mears and his decision to go, and his gun, shot?
10. The flashback, Walter and his mother, his partner taking the money, his rash words, going to the garage, the policeman seeing him and knowing about the quarrel, the hold-up, the partner being shot, the men escaping? Walter holding the gun? The testimony of the policeman in court, the mother? His being condemned?
11. The irony of the robbery, the car chase, the crash, the watch with the inscription, the background of Father O’Connor? praying, the timing for Walter’s execution, shaving, the meal, the jailbreak? The news of the pardon?
12. The importance of music, Schubert’s Ave Maria playing during the words of the Governor at the beginning? The plaintiff tone of Jackson and his singing? The executed man singing My Blue Heaven?
13. The touches of melodrama? Prison break, shooting? Walter wounded, recovering, the pardon?
14. The religious background, the man to be executed, the rabbi coming to visit him, in the cell, reading the Psalms, praying in Hebrew? Walter, Father O’Connor?, the visits, getting him to read the Scriptures, encouraging him, the dialogue with Mears? In the cell, the threat to his life, his pleading with Mears? Discussions about prayer and faith, the afterlife? His defence of the Governor and the emphasis on the sense of doing one’s duty? Out of the cell, helping Walter after the shot, the plea with Mears to save Walter?
15. A film of its time – but continued relevance in connection with capital punishment?
