Halliwell quotes are thin on the ground for Mervyn Le Roy’s social issues movie, in which Paul Muni stars as the wrongly-convicted escapee from the eponymous chain gang. This from the Filmgoer’s Companion:

‘Arguably the first American social melodrama to urge actual reforms; also the first of Warner’s ‘prestige’ films of the thirties. Paul Muni played the man forced against his will into a life of crime.’