After young Robert Graham (Phillips Holmes) commits a murder while drunk and defending his girlfriend, he is prosecuted by ambitious Mark Brady (Walter Huston) and sentenced to 10 years. Six years later, Brady becomes the prison warden and offers the beleaguered Robert a job as his chauffeur. Robert cleans up his act, but, on the eve of his pardon, his cellmate drags him back into the world of violence, and he faces a difficult choice that could return him to prison.
Audio commentary with film historian Nora Fiore (2021)
Behind the Mask (2021, 26 mins): author and critic Kim Newman discusses the non-horror career of actor Boris Karloff
Codes and Convictions (2021, 30 mins): video essay by Jonathan Bygraves on the many adaptations of Marvin Flavin's 'The Criminal Code'
The Howard Hawks Masterclass with John Carpenter (1997, 36 mins): archival audio recording of a presentation by the cult filmmaker from the British Film Institute's 1997 Howard Hawks retrospective at the National Film Theatre, London
Lux Radio Theatre: 'The Criminal Code' (1939, 59 mins): radio adaptation starring Edward G Robinson, Beverly Roberts and Paul Guilfoyle
Image galleries: on-set and promotional photography from 'The Criminal Code' and its lost Spanish-language version, 'El codigo penal'
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