The Story of a Women's Prison Today!

"Will she come out woman or wildcat?" trumpeted ads for this women-behind-bars classic. There's no question about how the film itself came out. Using familiar but sharply played characters to bring home its reform-minded message, Caged remains a pivotal genre classic.

Best Actress Academy Award nominee Eleanor Parker portrays the inmate whose transformation from sunny innocent to tight-lipped, worldwise con provides its focus . As the tyrannical floor matron, Best Supporting Actress nominee Hope Emerson is 6'2" of Grade-A malevolence. And an earnest prison superintendent, a sour lifer, a street-lamp tramp, a patsy, a society dame and other types add atmosphere to an Oscar-nominated script co-writer Virginia Kellogg researched while posing on the inside as a convict.