Brubaker (1980)

Brubaker (1980)

Brubaker is one of those underseen hidden gems I had no idea existed until I began researching little-known movies that might peak my interest. I adore prison dramas no matter how ordinary or clichéd they may be. This movie is abundant of prison movie clichés, but it is the political nature of the story that fascinated me, as well as the strong cast. Let’s get the bitter stuff out of the way first. What do I mean by a clichéd story? It is all about the characters and who they represent. We got the idealistic reformer, the tough-as-nails colored guard, the rotten person on the prison board, and the psycho prisoner. These type of characters pop up in nearly all prison movies, but at least we have a very talented cast playing these roles with near perfection.

 

Before I can delve in with what fascinated me the most, we need to discuss the plot. There is a new prison warden at Wakefield Prison. Henry Brubaker (Robert Redford) decides to begin his new position in an unorthodox way-disguised as an inmate. He looks, thinks, and pays attention to what the situation is at the prison. After having enough of the corruption, he reveals himself as the new warden. His agenda is ending the corruption once and for all. When the local business community led by John Deach (Murray Hamilton), whom benefits from the corruption begins to fight back, Brubaker is going to have plenty of trouble on his hands

 

Now we got that out of the way, I will talk about what truly fascinated me about the movie: the corruption of the prison system and the attempted overhaul of the system. One thing that struck out to me immediately is that there are no prison guards. Instead, there are prisoner trustees that get promotions if they shoot any escaping prisoners. The first thirty or so minutes of the film highlights the brutality such as the beatings, the sexual assaults, the bribery, and so forth.  The way Brubaker revealed himself to his prisoners is very genius and it gives him a sense of all the corruption happening around him. But then the underlying theme that change is hard for some people happens. We get a sense of how big this corruption scam is. How all the people in the local community are benefiting from this scam. The movie does a great job highlighting the events in the movies.

 

Because the story is moved forward though events, the characterization of the people in the movie is an afterthought. It did not bother me as it may have bothered other people, mainly because the story intrigued me. That being said, the cast did a terrific job. The one character that was fleshened out was Robert Redford’s Brubaker. Redford is a really talented actor and his performance kept you riveted, although I kept thinking he seems too nice to be a prison warden. We all know Murray Hamilton gets through by being a slimeball, and that is no difference here. We get an early Morgan Freeman performance as one of the deranged prisoners spent too much time under solitary confinement. There are also notable supporting character performances from the likes of Yaphet Kotto (from Alien fame) and Jane Alexander. There characters were not written well, but the actual performances were solid.

 

Overall, Brubaker is an underrated gem. It is a drama that highlights the corruption in the prison system and what makes this film more interesting is that it is based on the true life events of warden Thomas Murton who was hired by Arkansas governor Winthrop Rockefeller to reform one of the prisons, but was let go after one year due to bad publicity. W.D Richter’s screenplay does manage to convey how Brubaker’s methods created bad press for the town. More care could have been given to the characters, but it is the story that truly moved me. As a fan of prison dramas, I added one more prison drama to my list.

 

My Grade: A-