Best movie of this year hands down!

the audience applauded

I'll tell you why so serious

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

The title implies a fun movie, but in fact is depressing throughout. The movie starts out with three infantrymen in a trench, with Bogart rather than Cagney proving to be the nasty psychopath who genuinely loves killing. The war ends and Cagney finds he cannot get his old job back in the automotive repair shop after two years' absence. He gets a job as a taxi driver, unaware that he is part of a liquor bootlegging racket, and is caught and arrested...and later is essentially forced into working in this racket. He prospers and his war buddy becomes his lawyer, but wants out when a mutual friend gets killed. Then there is the other war buddy who is a rival in the rackets...Unlike "The Public Enemy", Cagney does not voluntarily join the rackets, and is never happy while in them. Arguably one of the strongest gangster movies which is not a morality play as such.

This is an excellent film about three World War I Army buddies whose lives change dramatically when they return from the war and get involved in crime, to varying degrees.Eddie (James Cagney) initially works as a cab driver sharing his old friend's (Frank McHugh) taxi. But, through a speakeasy owner, a woman named Panama (Gladys George), Eddie gets involved in the illegal alcohol business (e.g. during Prohibition). Initially, George (Humphrey Bogart), another of the soldiers, is his "first lieutenant" in the criminal enterprise, but later he becomes a rival racketeer. The third former soldier, Lloyd (Jeffrey Lynn), becomes a lawyer who, through Eddie, helps Panama beat a rap.Priscilla Lane plays Jean, a young girl Eddie corresponded with during the war when, unbeknownst to him, she was still in high school. Later, when Eddie's become "successful", he funds her singing debut, held in Panama's establishment. Though Eddie wants Jean for himself, she has eyes for "honest" Lloyd ... much like Panama has eyes for Eddie.These intrigues as well as the conflicts between Eddie and George make for an exciting picture which ends unforgettably!Directed by Raoul Walsh, this Mark Hellinger story was adapted by Jerry Wald, Richard Macauley, and Robert Rossen.

I've seen this movie on the big screen in several different settings; the Strand on Market street in frisco after Cagney's death; LACMA; the old Pussycat theatre on Hollywood blvd. this Raoul Walsh gangster starring two-gun Jimmy Cagney unfolds as the title suggests - over the course of the 1920s. the support is perfect - Jeffrey Lynn as the idealist; Priscilla Lane as the ideal; Frank McHugh as the sidekick; Gladys George as the wised up dame; Humphrey Bogart, the sociopath. This film has gained some devotees, showing at museums and revival houses over the past two decades. now it's considered one the best of the Warner's cycle. with the backstage musical Footlight Parade and turn in the masterwork the Public Enemy, this is Cagney at his best.

I'm not going to go too much into detail on the plot of the Roaring Twenties - it's pretty standard "gangster rises to the top" fare. The things that made this movie special to me were the performances, two in particular.The most prominent character in the film is Cagney, a streetwise cabbie who's lost his job - and really his place in the world - following World War I. He gets into the bootlegging business more or less by mistake, but then stays in it and determines to make a success of it. It's typical strong Cagney gangster fare.The first of the special performances to me was Humphrey Bogart's. This is a younger Bogart, not yet the gangster with a heart seen in High Sierra or the world-weary Bogie seen in Casablanca and many subsequent films. No, this younger Bogart is cunning, but is mostly a fearsome gun-toter seething with contempt for the world. I imagine he didn't have to go far to find inspiration. Warner Brothers didn't consider him a leading man at this time and had him in a string of mostly low-budget films, including an awful Western musical flick called Swing Your Lady the year before. Adding that he was in a reputedly wildly tempestuous marriage with Mayo Methot at the time, he had a deep well to draw from for the contempt and fire this role called for.The second special performance, and my favorite, is that of Gladys George as Panama. Panama is as tough and smart as any male club owner, a streetwise pitchwoman who doesn't flinch when the bullets fly. On the other hand, she's got a tender heart and a torch that quietly burns for Cagney despite his shortcomings and infatuations with other women. It is one of my favorite female roles of the '30s - it seemed that kind of nuance was generally reserved for the male lead. She has some real powerhouse moments in this film.So, a 9/10 for me - standard '30s gangster plot buoyed by some special performances.