Up the River

{{About|the 1930 film|the 1938 film|Up the River (1938 film)|the phrase|Sing Sing|the card game|Oh, hell}}

{{Infobox film

| name = Up the River

| image = File:Up the River (film poster).jpg

| caption = Poster with Claire Luce and Humphrey Bogart

| director = John Ford

| producer = William Fox

| writer = Maurine Dallas Watkins

| narrator =

| starring = Spencer Tracy
Humphrey Bogart

| music = James F. Hanley
Joseph McCarthy

| cinematography = Joseph H. August

| editing = Frank E. Hull

| distributor = Fox Film Corporation

| released = {{Film date|1930|10|10|New York|ref1=}}

| runtime = 92 minutes

| country = United States

| language = English

| budget =

| gross =

}}

Up the River is a 1930 American pre-Code comedy film directed by John Ford and starring Claire Luce as well as Spencer Tracy and Humphrey Bogart in their feature-film debuts and the only film in which the men appeared together. Fox remade the film in 1938 starring Preston Foster and Tony Martin.

Plot

Two convicts, St. Louis and Dannemora Dan, befriend another convict named Steve, who is in love with the incarcerated Judy. Steve is paroled, promising Judy that he will wait for her release five months later. He returns to his hometown in New England and his mother's home but is followed there by Judy's former boss, a scam artist named Frosby who threatens to expose Steve's prison record if Steve refuses to participate in a scheme to defraud his neighbors. Steve complies until Frosby defrauds his mother.

St. Louis and Dannemora Dan escape from prison and come to Steve's aid, removing a gun that he had planned to use to shoot Frosby and recovering bonds stolen by Frosby. They return to prison in time for its annual baseball game against a rival penitentiary.[https://web.archive.org/web/20071211202517/http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/title.jsp?stid=94575 Up the River at TCM Movie Database]{{cite news|url=http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/115297/Up-the-River/overview|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081006153601/http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/115297/Up-the-River/overview|url-status=dead|archive-date=October 6, 2008|title=Movies: About Up the River|first=Mordaunt|last=Hall|department=Movies & TV Dept.|work=The New York Times|author-link=Mordaunt Hall|date=2008|access-date=May 27, 2010}}

Cast

Spencer Tracy as Saint Louis
Claire Luce as Judy Fields
Warren Hymer as Dannemora Dan
Humphrey Bogart as Steve Jordan
Morgan Wallace as Frosby (Uncredited)
William Collier, Sr. as Pop
Joan Lawes as Jean
Bob Burns as "Slim", Bazooka Player (Uncredited and in blackface)
Edythe Chapman as Mrs. Jordan (Uncredited)
Ward Bond as Inmate Socked by Saint Louis (Uncredited)
Steve Pendleton as Morris (Uncredited){{cite web |title=p15759coll22_4 |url=https://digitalcollections.oscars.org/digital/api/collection/p15759coll22/id/4/download |website=digitalcollections.oscars.org |access-date=30 June 2023 |date=1931-01-29}}

Production

Spencer Tracy had previously starred in two Warner Bros. shorts earlier in 1930 and Humphrey Bogart had been an unbilled extra in a silent film and a star in two shorts. Up the River is the first credited feature film for both actors, and it is the only film in which Tracy and Bogart ever appeared together. Both were later cast in The Desperate Hours in 1955, but because neither would consent to second billing, the role intended for Tracy went to Fredric March instead. Bogart is listed fourth after the top-billed Tracy in Up the River, but his role is equally large and his likeness is featured prominently on posters that did not include Tracy's image. After Up the River, Fox awarded Tracy a contract as a leading man.

Up the River is the only John Ford film in which Bogart appeared, but Ford would later direct Tracy again in The Last Hurrah (1958).

Reception

In a contemporary review for The New York Times, critic Mordaunt Hall noted that the film "often proved to be violently funny" to his fellow audience members and wrote: "It has a number of clever incidents and lines, but now and again it is more than a trifle too slow."{{cite news |last=Hall |first=Mordaunt |date=1930-10-11 |title=The Screen: Levity in Prison. |work=The New York Times |page=21}}

References

Bibliography

{{cite book |editor1=New England Vintage Film Society |title=Spencer Tracy: The Pre-Code Legacy of a Hollywood Legend |location=Newton, Massachusetts |publisher=New England Vintage Film Society |year=2008 |isbn=978-1-4363-4138-7}}