True Stories 8: 70s—Escape from Alcatraz

After two weeks of looking at films about killers, let’s move on to criminals in jail for lesser crimes… who want to escape. And they want to escape from Alcatraz prison, on an island off the shore of San Francisco that was, notoriously, impossible to escape from. And yet, in Escape from Alcatraz [1969] by Richard Tuggle, that’s exactly what happens.

The film is based on the true story of Frank Morris who masterminded his escape and that of Clarence and John Anglin, two brothers whose cells adjoined his own. Unlike the films we’ve looked at for the last couple of weeks, these characters aren’t the hard-nosed killers that we’ve seen before. They were, quite simply, thieves. And they’d attempted prison breakouts before. Many criminals who broke out of prison or attempted to break out were sent to Alcatraz because there’d never been a successful escape. After all, it’s an island surrounded by water—and it’s over 3 miles from San Francisco’s shores. So even if someone got out, they’d be caught before they could swim the 3 miles… or, before Morris masterminded his escape, that’s what everyone thought.

Take a look at the trailer for the film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSS0fH9zzFY

If you’ve seen the film, you know it has a different tone… not sure if it would do well today because it’s not ‘fast-moving’ but is more methodical in nature. I think this is an interesting film for study because it IS so different from today’s action/caper/prison break-out movies. If you get a chance to see it, here’s a good exercise: imagine making it for today’s audiences. What would you change? How would you make it appealing? Would the action be more fast-paced or would you focus more on the minutiae of the escape through special effects perhaps? And would the characters have to change?

The characters. The characters in this film are interesting. Frank Morris is almost an understated guy—lots is kept inside. But we certainly sympathize with him for having to deal with the prison warden, who is not a peach of a guy. His nemesis, Dollison, is a stereotypical hard-nosed warden but he makes a great antagonist. In real life, the warden in charge of the prison was more of a good guy—making sure the prisoners were well-treated. But without that antagonist, the move wouldn’t have worked as well, hence the big-bad warden character.

But therein lies another area for exploration. What if you wrote this film without that stereotypical character but made the warden a good guy… in fact, made him an almost-friend of Frank. What if Frank and the warden played chess? But Frank just can’t stand being locked up so he uses that relationship to help him get out… in some clever way. And then the film could end with the warden almost glad that his escape was successful.

Looking at films from the past and how you could remake them by changing things around is an interesting way to refine your writing chops.

Next week, let’s head into the 80s with a biopic—Raging Bull.

Copyright © Diane Lake

24Jul22

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