Penitentiary

Episode of Series “Canada carries on”. A report on life and conditions in one of Canada’s penal institutions, illustrating current trends in the treatment of criminals. Defiant and contemptuous of society, a young first offender is brought to a federal penitentiary. The film shows the descipline, the confinement and the rigid routines which are part of a prisoner’s expiation for crime. It also deals with the challenge, now recognized by penitentiary authorities - either to change the prisoner into a law-abiding citizen or to have them come back a repeater - and with the new psychological approach which endeavours to determine the basic causes of a person’s wrong-doing.