Almost a decade after foundational gangster films like "Little Caesar", "The Public Enemy" and "Scarface" , "The Roaring Twenties" returned to the Prohibition Era with a glossier, more leisurely take on the times. At 106 minutes, it had enough time to introduce and develop more characters and served as a nostalgic look at that wild decade. The title actually was the first time the phrase "Roaring Twenties" had been used. In its own day it was usually called "The Jazz Age". The new name stuck and was the title of a popular early 60's TV show when the next wave of 1920's nostalgia hit.
In fact, the censors of the time objected to the making of the film as they didn't want a depraved time (as they saw it) glamorized. Warner Brothers went ahead and made it anyway, but they were careful to accommodate whatever else the Hays people wanted. This included that gangsters were never to be shown owning machine guns (though they did sneak a few in one of the film's many montages). There was also a preamble, written by uncredited associate producer and noted writer Mark Hellinger, who wrote the short story, "The World Moves On", on which the screenplay was based. Originally working on Broadway and in New York newspapers, his preamble noted that "the characters are composites of people I knew" who included Dutch Schultz and Legs Diamond. He also noted nostalgically that "This film is a memory and I am grateful for it.
Raoul Walsh had lately been directing vehicles for Mae West, Jack Benny and Burns & Allen but this film would set him on a new course that would include "They Drive by Night", "High Sierra" and "Action In the North Atlantic". A first rate writing team included future producer Jerry Wald and Hellinger all of whom would work on future films with Walsh. The film is notable for its montages which occur throughout to give the audience the historical background in which it was set. It includes World War I through Prohibition, the Stock Market Crash and 1939 in Europe. These are narrated by John Deering and are complex and brilliantly made compositions mixing stock and newsreel footage with Warner's movie clips (including one from "The Public Enemy"). They were made by future director Don Siegal ("Dirty Harry")
This is the third and last film with both Cagney and Bogart. It's Cagney's film, but Bogart has a substantial role. Here Cagney is tough and aggressive but is essentially a decent guy who doesn't mind being a little corrupt when his old employer won't rehire him. In fact the film goes out of its way to point out how the returning soldiers were "forgotten" and takes a very anti-Prohibition tone. Bogart is the heavy and from the very beginning we learn how ruthless and amoral he is, even seeming to enjoy killing. It's his voice; there seems to be no mercy in it. Bogart had been neglected by Warner Brothers, even after "The Petrified Forest", which only served to typecast him as a thug in a series of run of the mill pictures. They even put him in the hillbilly wrestling picture, "Swing Your Lady". This was his first A-picture in a while.
The setup is curiously like that of "Three On a Match", a 1932 Warner brothers-First National picture in which Bogart had a role. The third of the men is Lloyd Hart, played by Jeffrey Lynn, a young soldier in the same foxhole as Cagney's Eddie and Bogart's George. He's the good citizen of the three and had been in law school before the Army. He's ten years younger than them and looks it, so he easily carries off the good boy persona. He's not too good though, and ends up as the lawyer/accountant of the bootlegging operation until it's clear Eddie is in too deep.
Both Eddie and Lloyd fall for the same girl, a sweet Priscilla Lane as Jean Sherman. She came out of the "Four Girls" series and would get her best known role in "Arsenic and Old Lace". She had come from Fred Waring's band and actually sings her songs, a rare thing. Gladys George gets her most memorable role as the speakeasy manager and singer Panama Smith. The character is modeled after Texas Guinan, another old acquaintance of Hellinger, a flamboyant actress and speakeasy owner who greeted her customers with, "Hello, suckers!". Panama greets her customers at one point with, "Hello, chumps!" She deeply loves Eddie and knows she's the woman for him, just as she knows Jean and Lloyd belong together. She gets one of the great lines in film history at the end.
"The Roaring Twenties" alternates scenes of glamorous speakeasy nightclubs with scenes of gangsters, balancing the two so the film becomes a big 20's nostalgia piece as well as a gangster film. It set off a whole 20's craze. It also used advanced filmmaking technology that gives it more of a smooth look and good sound. This is where it differs greatly from the three seminal gangster films of 1931-32. They are shorter, relatively primitive looking and focus only on a few characters. This, however, is what gives them their power. "The Roaring Twenties" is a more fleshed-out film and very well made, but it does lack the punch of those earlier films. It's still highly recommended..
EXTRA NOTE: A curious coincidence. When Cagney first hears Priscilla Lane sing, he says, "She sounds like Nora Bayes," Nora Bayes was a very popular singer from 1900 into the early 1920's. She was instrumental in popularizing the song, "Over There", which became one of her biggest selling recordings. The song, of course, was written by George M. Cohan, who James Cagney would play in "Yankee Doodle Dandy" (1942). Nora Bayes would be played by Frances Langford.
In fact, the censors of the time objected to the making of the film as they didn't want a depraved time (as they saw it) glamorized. Warner Brothers went ahead and made it anyway, but they were careful to accommodate whatever else the Hays people wanted. This included that gangsters were never to be shown owning machine guns (though they did sneak a few in one of the film's many montages). There was also a preamble, written by uncredited associate producer and noted writer Mark Hellinger, who wrote the short story, "The World Moves On", on which the screenplay was based. Originally working on Broadway and in New York newspapers, his preamble noted that "the characters are composites of people I knew" who included Dutch Schultz and Legs Diamond. He also noted nostalgically that "This film is a memory and I am grateful for it.
Raoul Walsh had lately been directing vehicles for Mae West, Jack Benny and Burns & Allen but this film would set him on a new course that would include "They Drive by Night", "High Sierra" and "Action In the North Atlantic". A first rate writing team included future producer Jerry Wald and Hellinger all of whom would work on future films with Walsh. The film is notable for its montages which occur throughout to give the audience the historical background in which it was set. It includes World War I through Prohibition, the Stock Market Crash and 1939 in Europe. These are narrated by John Deering and are complex and brilliantly made compositions mixing stock and newsreel footage with Warner's movie clips (including one from "The Public Enemy"). They were made by future director Don Siegal ("Dirty Harry")
This is the third and last film with both Cagney and Bogart. It's Cagney's film, but Bogart has a substantial role. Here Cagney is tough and aggressive but is essentially a decent guy who doesn't mind being a little corrupt when his old employer won't rehire him. In fact the film goes out of its way to point out how the returning soldiers were "forgotten" and takes a very anti-Prohibition tone. Bogart is the heavy and from the very beginning we learn how ruthless and amoral he is, even seeming to enjoy killing. It's his voice; there seems to be no mercy in it. Bogart had been neglected by Warner Brothers, even after "The Petrified Forest", which only served to typecast him as a thug in a series of run of the mill pictures. They even put him in the hillbilly wrestling picture, "Swing Your Lady". This was his first A-picture in a while.
The setup is curiously like that of "Three On a Match", a 1932 Warner brothers-First National picture in which Bogart had a role. The third of the men is Lloyd Hart, played by Jeffrey Lynn, a young soldier in the same foxhole as Cagney's Eddie and Bogart's George. He's the good citizen of the three and had been in law school before the Army. He's ten years younger than them and looks it, so he easily carries off the good boy persona. He's not too good though, and ends up as the lawyer/accountant of the bootlegging operation until it's clear Eddie is in too deep.
Both Eddie and Lloyd fall for the same girl, a sweet Priscilla Lane as Jean Sherman. She came out of the "Four Girls" series and would get her best known role in "Arsenic and Old Lace". She had come from Fred Waring's band and actually sings her songs, a rare thing. Gladys George gets her most memorable role as the speakeasy manager and singer Panama Smith. The character is modeled after Texas Guinan, another old acquaintance of Hellinger, a flamboyant actress and speakeasy owner who greeted her customers with, "Hello, suckers!". Panama greets her customers at one point with, "Hello, chumps!" She deeply loves Eddie and knows she's the woman for him, just as she knows Jean and Lloyd belong together. She gets one of the great lines in film history at the end.
"The Roaring Twenties" alternates scenes of glamorous speakeasy nightclubs with scenes of gangsters, balancing the two so the film becomes a big 20's nostalgia piece as well as a gangster film. It set off a whole 20's craze. It also used advanced filmmaking technology that gives it more of a smooth look and good sound. This is where it differs greatly from the three seminal gangster films of 1931-32. They are shorter, relatively primitive looking and focus only on a few characters. This, however, is what gives them their power. "The Roaring Twenties" is a more fleshed-out film and very well made, but it does lack the punch of those earlier films. It's still highly recommended..
EXTRA NOTE: A curious coincidence. When Cagney first hears Priscilla Lane sing, he says, "She sounds like Nora Bayes," Nora Bayes was a very popular singer from 1900 into the early 1920's. She was instrumental in popularizing the song, "Over There", which became one of her biggest selling recordings. The song, of course, was written by George M. Cohan, who James Cagney would play in "Yankee Doodle Dandy" (1942). Nora Bayes would be played by Frances Langford.
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