Hell's Kitchen

1939
Approved
1h 21m

IMDb RATING

6.5/10

427

YOUR RATING

Ronald Reagan, Frankie Burke, Gabriel Dell, Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall, Billy Halop, Bobby Jordan, Margaret Lindsay, Larry Nunn, Bernard Punsly, and The Dead End Kids in Hell's Kitchen (1939)

A group of tough city kids have 'graduated' from reform school and are assigned to a "Boy's Town" type of inmate self-government city shelter, run by Hiram Krispan, a crooked superintendent, assisted by Buck, an ex-racketeer on probation. Buck enjoys trying to straighten out the kids and joins with them and social workers Beth Avery and Jim Donahue, in getting Krispan removed from his job.

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Action Adventure Crime Drama Romance

Group of former reform school kids assigned to corrupt-run shelter. They ally with social workers to oust crooked superintendent and ex-racketeer trying to reform them. Focuses on inmate sel... Read allGroup of former reform school kids assigned to corrupt-run shelter. They ally with social workers to oust crooked superintendent and ex-racketeer trying to reform them. Focuses on inmate self-governance dynamics and exposing corruption.Group of former reform school kids assigned to corrupt-run shelter. They ally with social workers to oust crooked superintendent and ex-racketeer trying to reform them. Focuses on inmate self-governance dynamics and exposing corruption.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

6.5/10

427

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

Videos1

Trailer 2:21

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Photos5

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Storyline

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Did you know

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Trivia
As a result of a PTA complaint, this was the last gangster angle picture made by The Dead End Kids.

Goofs
At 11:50 min Tony (Billy Halop) is rustled out of the back of the shelter's car from under a dusty tarp, his clothes dusty and his hair disheveled; seconds later outside the car his clothes and hair are neat.

Quotes
Bingo: You can slap me around all you want, but Joey here can't be missing any meals, can't you see he's sick?
Hiram Krispan: If Joey weren't a bad boy he'd get better quicker.

Connections
Featured in Public Enemies: The Golden Age of the Gangster Film (2008)

Soundtracks
Auld Lang Syne
(1788) (uncredited)
Traditional
Lyrics by Robert Burns
Sung a cappella by Stanley Fields and the boys
Played during the end credits

User reviews12

Review

Featured review

5/10

Cashing In On Boys Town

The first of two films in which Ronald Reagan was featured with the Dead End Kids was Hell's Kitchen where after one stint of time in reform school in Crime School, the boys are back in the juvenile joint. The adult players take a distinct back seat to the boys in both these films.

Crime School was an out and out remake of the James Cagney classic The Mayor Of Hell and this one also has aspects of those films in it as well. We've got a self righteous warden of the school in Grant Mitchell who's once again skimming off the tops and treating the kids like dirt. His infamous cooler is an old meat locker where he locks the kids in to 'cool' them off. When one of them dies, it all hits the fan.

Challenging him for control of the institution is paroled racketeer, Stanley Fields who is playing his role like a cut rate Wallace Beery. Ronald Reagan is his nephew and Margaret Lindsay is the secretary of the school under Mitchell and who is ready to quit when Caesar arrives on the scene.

Jack Warner must have really been in a bind here because he even acknowledges a hit film from another studio. One of the reforms that Fields wants to bring in is a kind of self governing institution by the kids like Father Flanagan's Boys Town. In fact I'm sure that's why this film was made, to cash in on the success of Boys Town.

No Oscar winning performances here though like Spencer Tracy's. Still it's entertaining enough.