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Up the River Overview:

Up the River (1930) was a Comedy - Crime Film directed by John Ford and produced by William Fox.

SYNOPSIS

Tracy's first screen appearance (and Bogart's second) in a prison comedy by Ford. Ex-con Tracy gets himself and former cellmate Hymer thrown back into a pen, only this time it's a comfy medium-security prison with lots of athletics, amateur theatricals, and romance with the women just over the wall. They're joined by cellmate Bogart, who gets mixed up in a romance with Luce and a blackmail plot by Wallace.

(Source: available at Amazon AMC Classic Movie Companion).

Up the River BlogHub Articles:

Up the River – 1930

By Bogart Fan on Jun 10, 2013 From The Bogie Film Blog

My Rating —Worth a Watch—  Your Bogie Fix:  out of 5 Bogies! Director:  John Ford The Lowdown Two inmates (Spencer Tracy and Warren Hymer) escape prison to help a recently released convict (Humphrey Bogart) who’s being blackmailed. What I Thought This is one of the few Bogart films ... Read full article

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Up the River Quotes:

Saint Louis: [Cautioning Steve on why he should not embark on a violent act of vengeance] Steve, did you ever see a guy go to the 'chair'? Huh? Well, I did. I spent eight months in that Condemned Row. Watched 'em go, one by one. Pals of mine. Guys you'd say 'good morning' to in the morning. And 'good night' to at night. And then they'd go. And I'd wait, day after day, week after week, month after month, wondering if I was gonna' be the next to go.
Saint Louis: [Voice rising with emotion] Let me tell ya', that's no picnic, kid! Listenin' to the drone of that lousy motor and watchin' those lights go dim...
Saint Louis: [pauses to let the words sink in] Steve, come on, don't be a sap.
Saint Louis: Well?
Dannemora Dan: Well, I ain't gonna go through with it, I tell you.
Saint Louis: Now, listen. I never break my word, and I gave my word to Judy - and we're goin' to New England, and we're goin' tonight!
Man: I can't go to New England, not tonight. I'm in the finale.
Man: [offscreen] Oh, St. Louis! What's the use?
Saint Louis: Say, if you don't do like I tell yuh, it's gonna be your finale!
Morris: [In the prison: recognizing another inmate, one who apparently caused him to end up in prison] Jessell!
Jessell, man who caused Morris' incarceration: Well, if it ain't little Morris! So YOU'RE here?
Morris: Yes, I'm here. And YOU'RE here, too, where you belong.
Jessell, man who caused Morris' incarceration: Ah, ya' got me all wrong, kid. I lost more money on that horse than YOU did.
Morris: Did you, Jessell? Did you lose your position and money and friends? And mother?... She died at my trial. You killed her. If it hadn't been for you...
Jessell, man who caused Morris' incarceration: Shut up, ya' little swine! You were a thief long before I knew ya'!
Morris: [Lunges and grabs Jessel] That's a lie! Take it back! Take it back!
Steve Jordan: [Jumping in to break it up] Cut it out! Cut it out!
Steve Jordan: Go on, scram!
[Shoves Jessel away; Jessel runs off, Morris remains with downcast look on face]
Steve Jordan: .
Steve Jordan: Don't do that... Come on, don't take it so hard.
Morris: I can't help it. How did your family feel?
Steve Jordan: [Pensively pausing] Well, they don't know. I changed my name... They think I'm in China.
Morris: How'd you do that?
Steve Jordan: Well, I got friends out there. They forward my letters home and cable my folks once a month.
[Loud prison bell rings]
Steve Jordan: I'll see ya' around. I work in the office over there. I gotta' lot of new fish comin' in. You know - associates, inmates. Come on, son. Buck up, boy.
[Gives Morris a reassuring pat and heads off]
Saint Louis: Steve, you're on the square with Judy, aren't ya'?
Steve Jordan: You bet I am!
Saint Louis: That's all we wanted to know.
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Up the River Facts
Spencer Tracy received a 2-week leave of absence from a hit Broadway show in order to appear in this film. This required the film to be shot under a very tight production schedule.
The first of Humphrey Bogart's feature-length films to be released, on October 12, 1930. His second, "A Devil with Women", was released six days later, on October 18.
This is the first John Ford film in which Spencer Tracy appeared: their second collaboration took place three decades later, when Tracy starred in Ford's The Last Hurrah. It is strange to realize that these two great Irish American icons only collaborated two times (Tracy narrated How the West Was Won, one of the sequences of which was shot by Ford, but that doesn't count as a true collaboration), but for most of their careers, they were bound to different studios, Ford to 20th Century-Fox and Tracy to M.G.M. By the time the freelance era rolled around in the late 1950s, Tracy was appearing in very few movies.
Broadway producer Herman Shumlin granted Spencer Tracy two weeks leave from his hit drama "The Last Mile" after the actor appealed to him for the opportunity to work for John Ford in this picture.
This is the only movie in which Humphrey Bogart and Spencer Tracy co-star. Although Tracy and Bogart were good friends, they never appeared in another movie together, as Bogart was tied to a contract with Warner Bros. for much of his career while Tracy was bound first to Fox, and then (most famously) to MGM. When the freelance era rolled around in the 1950s and both were free of their studio contracts, the two talked about co-starring together in a picture, but according to Tracy's lover Katharine Hepburn, they could never agree on who would get top billing (although Tracy was the more respected thespian, Bogart was more popular at the box office; however, after playing second-fiddle to Clark Gable for many years at MGM, Tracy wasn't about to accept second billing at that time in his career). Hepburn recalled they considered a suggested compromise that would have created an "X"-shaped credit in which Humphrey Tracy would have co-starred with Spencer Bogart, when read normally.
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