Documentary

A Call for Help from Sing Sing!

This plea to reduce the growing numbers of imprisoned youths, with its warning from the celebrated warden of Sing Sing prison, is drawn from the October 1, 1934, issue of Hearst Metrotone News. The segment’s dynamic visuals, on-camera personal appeal, and extended length make the story atypical for a newsreel, but the form’s usual breathless pace is applied to a cautionary fable: the too-frequent “road” of youth from school through unemployment, homelessness, and crime and on to the gates of the penitentiary. -National Film Preservation Foundation