Hell's House (1932)

⁣"Hell's House" is a 1932 American drama film directed by Howard Higgin. The screenplay by Paul Gangelin and B. Harrison Orkow, set during the waning days of the Prohibition era, is based on a story by Higgin.

When orphaned Jimmy Mason is taken in by his Aunt Emma and Uncle Henry, he meets their boarder Matt Kelly, who impresses the young man with his boastful swagger and alleged political connections, although in reality he's a bootlegger. The boy's life is disrupted when, as one of Kelly's hired hands, he refuses to identify his boss during a police raid and is sentenced to three years of hard labor in reform school, where he befriends a sickly boy named Shorty, who eventually is sent to solitary confinement.