There Was a Crooked Man... is a 1970 Western film directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and starring Kirk Douglas, Henry Fonda, Hume Cronyn, Warren Oates, Burgess Meredith, and Lee Grant.
Paris Pitman (Douglas) steals half a million dollars and hides it in a nest of rattlesnakes. He's arrested soon after and is sentenced to a penitentiary. He will try to escape and get his loot back. After a riot in the penitentiary, Woodward W. Lopeman (Fonda), an ex-sheriff, is appointed as warden. He will try to improve the living conditions of the convicts.
This film provides examples of:
- The Alcatraz: The penitentiary is in the middle of the desert and it is difficult not being spotted by the guards on the walls. Nobody has ever escaped from it when Paris Pitman arrives.
- Ambiguously Gay: Cyrus Mcnutt and Dudley Whinner. They live together; they are not manly; Dudley prepares food for Cyrus; they quarrel like and old couple, but Dudley really loves Cyrus: when Cyrus pretends to commit suicide, Dudley is really moved.
- Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: Cyrus Mcnutt and Dudley Whinner quarrel during most of the film. When Cyrus pretends to commit suicide, Dudley is really moved.
- Bait the Dog: The Missouri Kid is an amiable man who tries to help his cellmates and dreams of settling down as a farmer after escaping. He also murders one of the kinder guards in cold blood during the escape, although this causes him to have a Sanity Slippage and abandon trying to escape.
- The Big Guy: Ah-Ping is tall, strong, violent and mute.
- Black Comedy Rape: During the second prison riot, the schoolteacher is progressively undressed by the inmates.
- Brick Joke: During his Establishing Character Moment, Coy Cavendish has a good view of the bust of his girlfriend. Later, when Dudley Whinner draws breasts, he says the other inmates that the drawing is very realistic.
- Clothing Damage: During the second riot, Miss Brundidge gets her clothes ripped off by the inmates, leaving her in her undergarments. Originally, the scene had her getting stripped totally nude, running through the desert in the aftermath of the riot.
- Con Man: Cyrus Mcnutt and Dudley Whinner pretend to collect money to help the deaf-mutes. Dudley Whinner is supposed to be a deaf-mute.
- Criminal Procedural: The main characters are convicts serving prison terms.
- Depraved Homosexual: Skinner, a penitentiary guard, tries to force the young Coy Cavendish into a relationship with him. He promises him less hard work. Since this does not work, he decides to whip him. He cannot do it, because this triggers a Prison Riot.
- Establishing Character Moment: The first sequences of the film:
- Paris Pitman steals half a million dollars from a family in grandiloquent fashion. He also shoots one of his accomplices down.
- Woodward W. Lopeman rejects a bribe from a prostitute.
- Floyd Moon shoots at a disarmed sheriff Lopeman after attacking a hat-seller.
- Cyrus Mcnutt and Dudley Whinner try to swindle people, but it fails.
- Coy Cavendish is going to have sex with a girl, but her angry father breaks off.
- Fake Charity: Cyrus Mcnutt and Dudley Whinner pretend to collect money to help the deaf-mutes. Dudley Whinner is supposed to be a deaf-mute.
- Fanservice:
- The Establishing Character Moment of Coy Cavendish, where Edwina (Pamela Hensley) is topless.
- During the second prison riot, the schoolteacher (Barbara Rhoades) is progressively undressed by the inmates.
- Gentleman Thief: Paris Pitman in the opening sequence.
- Great Escape: The film is about Pitman's plan to escape the penitentiary.
- Hates Baths: All the inmates are reluctant when Woodward W. Lopeman wants them to take a bath. Missouri Kid really hates baths and other inmates have to drag him into a tub.
- Hellhole Prison: The penitentiary is this at first (bad food served in the pouring rain, hard work, a sadistic homosexual guard, a warden who bribes inmates to beat up others) and then Lopeman is appointed as warden.
- Incorruptible Pure Pureness: Woodward W. Lopeman does not succumb to temptations, like the offer of the prostitute in his Establishing Character Moment or the possibility to get a share of Pitman's loot. Subverted in the end: he gets away with the money.
- The Informant: Subverted. Floyd Moon has been an informant many times in the past, according to Lopeman, but this time he does not agree to give information about Pitman's plans to Lopeman, because he thinks he is his friend. He's wrong.
- Inscrutable Oriental: The taciturn Ah-Ping.
- Interrupted Intimacy:
- When Coy Cavendish is going to have sex with a girl, his father breaks off and theatens him with a gun.
- Pitman is having sex with two prostitutes when Lomax recognizes him through a peep hole and start shouting.
- It Works Better with Bullets: During the bath scene, Lopeman leaves his gun within reach of Pitman. Pitman is going to take it, but Lopeman tells him the weapon is disarmed.
- Karmic Death: Paris Pitman dies from a sting of a rattlesnake that was hidden in his loot.
- Killing in Self-Defense: Coy Cavendish hits the angry father of his latest girlfriend with a billiard ball in self-defense. The father dies, and Coy is sentenced to hang.
- Knight Templar Parent: The father of the girl Coy Cavendish is going to have sex with. He theatens him with a gun.
- The Lancer: Floyd Moon is a contrast with Pitman: he is not very clever, he does not speak much, and he respects some kind of moral code.
- Lawman Gone Bad: In the end, Woodward W. Lopeman gets away with the money Pitman stole.
- The Leader: Pitman is the charismatic mastermind of a Ragtag Bunch of Misfits.
- The Load: Cyrus keeps on complaining about his health and the harsh living conditions in the penitentiary.
- Mammy: There is one at the Lomax's house.
- Manipulative Bastard: Paris Pitman manipulates everybody to escape and get his loot back. His main asset is his loot: he makes the others believe he will share his loot with them so that the other inmates help him and the first warden improves his living conditions. Since this does not work with Lopeman, he collaborates with him on the improvement of the living conditions of the inmates, so that Lopeman thinks he can trust him. Nobody can trust Pitman: he intends to escape, to get back his loot and not to share it with anyone.
- Mentor Archetype: The Missouri Kid is a convict who has spent most of his life in the penitentiary. He tells Pitman about how to put up with the penitentiary living conditions.
- Miss Kitty: Madam (Claudia McNeil), the owner of the brothel where Paris Pitman is arrested.
- Naïve Newcomer: Coy Cavendish is young, spirited, but he is not prepared to the realities of the penitentiary: in the first brawl, he is easily knocked out by another convict; in the climax, he is used by Pitman in a diversion and he is killed.
- No Honor Among Thieves: Pitman is not loyal to his accomplices. In the opening sequence, he shoots one down. In the end, he uses Coy Cavendish for a diversion that is a suicide mission. He also abandons Cyrus Mcnutt and Dudley Whinner inside the penitentiary. Finally, he shoots Floyd Moon down.
- The Old Convict: The Missouri Kid (Burgess Meredith).
- Only Known by Their Nickname: Prison guards Whiskey and Tobaccy are only ever called by the nicknames they received due to their preferred choice of bribe.
- Pet the Dog: Skinner is a hard-nosed guard who disapproves of Lopeman's more lenient tactics, but after the riot, he doesn't rub it in how Lopeman's plan didn't work.
- Preserve Your Gays: Depraved Homosexual guard Skinner survives the film, as does the Ambiguously Gay couple of Cyrus and Dudley (whereas most of their unambiguously heterosexual cohorts are less lucky).
- Prison Riot:
- A first one occurs when Coy Cavendish is going to be whipped. Francis Le Goff, the first penitentiary warden, is killed by Ah-Ping during this riot.
- A second riot is planned by Pitman as a diversion for the Great Escape.
- Romancing the Widow: After he escaped, Pitman tries to steal a horse from a widow. She catches him and he soon charms her.
- Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: Pitman (The Leader) has no choice. He must carry out his plan with the help of the people he finds in the penitentiary and they are misfits: Floyd Moon (The Lancer), Dudley Whinner (The Smart Guy), Ah-Ping (The Big Guy), Cyrus Mcnutt (The Load), the Missouri Kid (the Mentor) and Coy Cavendish (the Naïve Newcomer).
- Scarily Competent Tracker: Woodward W. Lopeman tracks Paris Pitman very easily.
- The Sheriff: Woodward W. Lopeman (Henry Fonda) before he is fired.
- Shirtless Scene: When Coy Cavendish breaks rocks. Later, Paris Pitman (Kirk Douglas) doing the same action.
- The Smart Guy: Dudley Whinner can paint and he is much wiser than the others: he does not want to embark on the risky escape plan.
- Snake Pit: Paris Pitman hides his loot in a snake pit.
- Spiteful Spit: When he is going to be whipped, Coy Cavendish spits on Skinner's face.
- Titled After the Song: "There Was a Crooked Man" is an English nursery rhyme.
- Villain Protagonist: Paris Pitman is the main character of the film and he is a thief who wants to escape a penitentiary and to get his loot back, at any cost. He manipulates the other characters to achieve his goal.
- The Voiceless: Ah-Ping.
- Wide-Eyed Idealist: Woodward W. Lopeman, who wants to improve the life of the inmates, to educate them... It ends up badly because Paris Pitman sets up a riot during the opening of the penitentiary refectory, as a diversion for his Great Escape. Many other inmates try to escape during the riot too.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness:
- In the opening sequence, after stealing the Lomaxes' money, Pitman shoots one of his accomplices down to get the whole loot.
- Paris Pitman kills Floyd Moon after he helped him to escape.
