1949
Directed by Raoul Walsh
This is probably the most violent film on the list so far. I suppose that they got away with it because bad guys get their comeuppance. Still, I was shocked; I mean, a man does gets his face steamed off.
This film is about Cody Jarrett who has some serious mommy issues, as psychopaths usually do. He does psychotic things, gets put in jail, breaks out, and then proceeds to do more psychotic things.
We haven't seen a good gangster film in awhile and this brought me back to the glory days, in the early thirties, where we had one every five movies. Besides the sheer shock value, this is actually a really good movie; exciting to the end with really excellent lines. Just goes to show that you don't have to watch a Scorsese movie to have a bad guy blood bath.
RATING: *****
Interesting Facts:
The bizarre relationship between Cody and his mother was based on the relationship that bank robber Kate Barker had with her sons.
Ranked #4 in AFI's top 10 gangster films.
Cagney was the ultimate gangster. None above.
ReplyDeleteI believe there's some doubt as to whether Kate "Ma" Barker really was a criminal mastermind. But the Boney M song was pretty good so let's not look a gift horse in the mouth.
ReplyDeleteIt's long been a fascination of mine when you see newspaper headlines in a film to look at the other, smaller headlines around them. Something about it amuses me. Maybe it's inspired by jokes on it in The Simpsons. So recently I've been pausing the video to read them all. I swear the other headlines in this were exactly the same as in Gun Crazy I saw a couple of days ago. Like they're using the same template each time but inserting their own lead story depending upon the plot of the film. Unfortunately I've already deleted Gun Crazy so I can't go back and double-check this.
Very good film, by the way.
And right now I'm in the middle of watching The Reckless Moment. 27mins in and she buys a newspaper. Ignore the main story and IT'S EXACTLY THE SAME MINOR HEADLINE! "Ballot Awaited Today After Amendments". Also "State Bureau Must Rent New Offices". If they're the most interesting other things going on in town every day, you can well see why the editor made the murder the lead story.
DeleteHaha, some of these headlines being used for forty years!
Deletehttp://gutbrain.com/newtaxbill.html
Nice one Dessie, Thank you for the link..
ReplyDeleteAnd relieved to know I'm not the only one, as I wonder if they are all made up (always thought not, that would be a lot of work) - apart from any 'topical' ones ('Red Army advances on all fronts' sort of thing). One day someone with nothing else to do will discover what some of these stories were about. I always thought they had just taken some local paper and simply cut and pasted (in the real sense of the phrase) the film story into the gap. Seems it's a bit more sophisticated than that.
Notable 'Simpsons' sub headline? 'Spinning newspaper headlines back in vogue'
"Bear Patrol Steps Up Bombing Campaign"
DeleteThat's really interesting; thanks for sharing!
ReplyDelete