Cagney is often an Irish-American on screen but in his personal life he was proud of his Norwegian grandfather ("Nelson"). The problem with casting him was that he LOOKED and ACTED so Irish. He was so often a cocky bantamweight, as he is in this movie. He had a unique style. A bouncy half-psychotic body language, the kind that befits an ex-dancer. In this movie, watch him literally bounce from foxhole to foxhole. And his working-class New York accent was always singularly clipped and informed by some inner characterological melody. The style, unmistakable, was adapted to different genres -- to comedy ("One, Two, Three") and with a complete absence of success to Westerns. My God, "The Oklahoma Kid" in painful to watch.
That's the Cagney we think of when we think of "Cagney," and yet the guy may have been under-rated as an actor. For instance, I can't really imagine another actor doing Cagney's breakdown scene in the big house in "White Heat." And whatever one might think of "The Gallant Hours" as a film, Cagney cannot be blamed for anything that's wrong with it. The same can be said for "Come Fill the Cup." Cagney's performance here is pretty much his street-wise tough guy character transported to France by the U. S. Army, shows his cowardice, and then is redeemed by some kind of epiphany known only to Hollywood screenwriters. During those few scenes when he's not making wisecracks in Yiddish or insulting priests ("Oh, Hi, St. Francis. How's all 'em monks?") he does a decent job, even an engaging one. His terror during combat, his remorse before he dies, is as convincing as his bravado on the sidewalks.
But this movie is a product of its times and a viewer has to go with the flow. Mischa Moskovitz, for instance, assumes the alias of Mike Murphy in order to go overseas with the 69th. He's a flat-out stereotype, a clever guy with a Semitic face. In one of his earlier movies his character was called something like Freddy Bignose. And yet he dies honorably and is prayed over in Hebrew by Father Duffy in a moving scene.
The action scenes look stage bound and of course the effects are primitive by today's standards, but the movie plunges along at such a pace that a viewer is likely to be drawn into it. The only slow scenes are those that drag in religion more or less by the heels. Kind of like Padre Alan Hale talking to Dennis Morgan while both fly through a thunderstorm. Of course anyone might think religious thoughts during extreme stress, but this movie makes it so relentlessly obvious.
Those dull moment aren't enough to make it unwatchable. It's kind of fun. You just need to work a little harder to get past some of the more dated stuff.
That's the Cagney we think of when we think of "Cagney," and yet the guy may have been under-rated as an actor. For instance, I can't really imagine another actor doing Cagney's breakdown scene in the big house in "White Heat." And whatever one might think of "The Gallant Hours" as a film, Cagney cannot be blamed for anything that's wrong with it. The same can be said for "Come Fill the Cup." Cagney's performance here is pretty much his street-wise tough guy character transported to France by the U. S. Army, shows his cowardice, and then is redeemed by some kind of epiphany known only to Hollywood screenwriters. During those few scenes when he's not making wisecracks in Yiddish or insulting priests ("Oh, Hi, St. Francis. How's all 'em monks?") he does a decent job, even an engaging one. His terror during combat, his remorse before he dies, is as convincing as his bravado on the sidewalks.
But this movie is a product of its times and a viewer has to go with the flow. Mischa Moskovitz, for instance, assumes the alias of Mike Murphy in order to go overseas with the 69th. He's a flat-out stereotype, a clever guy with a Semitic face. In one of his earlier movies his character was called something like Freddy Bignose. And yet he dies honorably and is prayed over in Hebrew by Father Duffy in a moving scene.
The action scenes look stage bound and of course the effects are primitive by today's standards, but the movie plunges along at such a pace that a viewer is likely to be drawn into it. The only slow scenes are those that drag in religion more or less by the heels. Kind of like Padre Alan Hale talking to Dennis Morgan while both fly through a thunderstorm. Of course anyone might think religious thoughts during extreme stress, but this movie makes it so relentlessly obvious.
Those dull moment aren't enough to make it unwatchable. It's kind of fun. You just need to work a little harder to get past some of the more dated stuff.