CONVICTS FOUR: viewers snore

Having just struggled to remain awake and engaged through CONVICTS FOUR I am seriously considering reviewing my ranking of Ben Gazzara as my favourite actor of the modern cinema.
He won the title through his work with John Cassavetes, Peter Bogdanovich and Marco Ferreri in the 1970s and 80s. His performances just blew me away, and I felt there was something of a modern day Bogart quality to the characters he played. So I wanted to see more of his work, and while I discovered there was a great deal of dross among his tv

movies I was prepared to forgive that as the price an actor paid to keep working. He made the cinematic movies for art and subsidised them with the tv stuff was how I rationalised it.
I've been more reluctant to explore his earlier work from the 1960s because so much of what I read about it sounded so unappealing, and CONVICTS FOUR confirmed my worst fears. Not only is this 1962 true-life drama deathly dull but Gazzara is too. He brings nothing to the part that would differentiate him from the way a dozen other on-the-rise young actors in the early 60s would have played it. He's flat, uninspired and unconvincing.
It doesn't help that the tension of the early scenes in which convicted murderer John Resko (Gazzara) counts down his final hours before execution is completely destroyed by the opening titles which announce that John Resko served as technical advisor on the project - and therefore must still be alive unless he advised from beyond the grave. When, almost at the last minute, the death sentence is commuted to life in jail I didn't realise I'd be required to serve it alongside him.
I've heard a life sentence described as worse than death and that's pretty much how I felt as I accompanied Resko through the following 17 years behind bars in the company of a horribly hammy Ray Walston and pseudo-tough guy Sammy Davis Jr, with cameos from Vincent Price, Rod Steiger and Broderick Crawford. I've never understood the rationale behind the description of cameo appearances by famous faces as 'guest stars.' The phrase suggests that there's a regular show with a regular cast which they are joining for a one-off guest appearance, but a film by its very nature (franchises excepted) is a one-off so - logically - every cast member must be a guest since none of them will be returning for a subsequent episode.
But I digress. The sole purpose of these guest appearances would appear to be to inject a bit of much needed life into the proceedings, but they actually serve more as a distraction because they bring with them the promise of interesting new characters who don't actually stick around long enough to fulfill their potential.
Which leaves us with no choice but to focus on the relationship that develops between Resko and the unnamed prison officer (Stuart Whitman) who rises to the rank of warden, and encourages Resko to develop his natural talent as an artist. It's a worthy cause but when it's stretched out over 17 years you'll appreciate that the development is somewhat on the slow side to put it mildly.
If writer-director Millard Kaufman's intention was to illustrate the case for the abolition of the death penalty he failed. CONVICTS FOUR will have you begging for a swift end to the misery.