Miriam Hopkins is surprisingly good in this film and makes it shine from beginning to end. It is a brilliant script by Ben Hecht and Charles McArthur, one of their many triumphs, and the brilliant dialogue of often sharpened eloquence by Miriam Hopkins is one of the major assets of the film. The cinematography is wonderful and some scenes will be etched in your mind, like when the Vigilante walk Brian Donlevy through the muddy streets to his hanging. Edward G. Robinson makes one of his many ruthless crooks obsessed with stupid cruelty, while Joel McCrea plays an honest man, poet and lover and does it quite credibly. It is a great film loaded with drama, emotion, jealousy, conflict, crookedness, wickedness and what not, to remain enjoyable even after ninety years.
Review of Barbary Coast
