White Heat [Blu-ray]

James Cagney as a Disturbed Gangster & Noir Protagonist.
"White Heat" is unusual in that it is a genre film that is also widely considered to be film noir. It's immistakably a gangster film, yet it deviates from the conventions of that genre in that its main character, Cody Jarrett, is complex and introverted enough to be a noir protagonist. "White Heat" was masterfully directed by Raoul Walsh and features James Cagney in one of this most memorable gangster roles. Treasury Department investigator Philip Evans (John Archer) is hot on the trail of the notorious criminal Cody Jarrett (James Cagney) after the Jarrett gang has robbed a mail train, killing several people and making off with a substantial sum. In order to guarantee himself immunity from the multiple murder charge, Cody confesses to an out-of-state robbery that took place at the same time, for which he receives a couple of years in prison. But the Feds are wise to his scheme and place an undercover agent (Edmond O'Brien) in the cell with Cody, hoping to learn the identity of the...

the film that ended the 40's with a bang.
I have seen White Heat numerous times and it never flags or fails. It's the swan song of Warner Brothers gangster films and is one of the wildest rides you can imagine. It's a heist film, with a twist and it comes in the form of a gangster so bent, so over the top, that no one has come close to it.No one is stupid enough to try. James Cagney plays Cody Jarrett, a ruthless gangster,killer,strong arm robber and mama's boy. His work is so compelling, so overwhelming and vicious that it stunned viewers in 1949 and followed Cagney for the rest of his career. Cagney loathed the success of the role, fearing that it overshadowed all of his other screen performances, which it did, for its successful portrayal of a lunatic force of nature. Cagney was an actor who could and did anything. Gangsters, screwball comedies, dramas, musicals, westerns, war films, and Shakespeare. To be typed as an insane killer, who could shoot trapped henchmen in a car trunk while munching on a chicken...

A PENETRATING FLASH POINT OF DIABOLICAL EXCITEMENT!
The intense character study of criminal insanity in Raoul Walsh's "White Heat" (1949) is most likely the other great Cagney performance that has endured the test of time in Warner's gangster genre. Cagney plays the psychotic and sadistic Arthur 'Cody' Jarrett, a ruthless gang leader with a penchant for deriving pleasure from the affliction of pain. Plagued by torturous headaches and a mother fixation with Freud written all over it, Cody revels in murdering his wounded accomplice during a jail break. Cody's 'ma' (Margaret Whycherly) has allowed herself the luxury to forget that she's given birth to the criminal anti-Christ. Meanwhile, Cody's wife, Verna (Virginia Mayo) flaunts her sexuality to every man she meets while enduring the brutality and neglect of her unstable husband. This, of course, ends badly for all concerned. The plot thickens when a henchman plots an 'accident' for Cody, that is foiled when an undercover cop, Vic Pardo (Edmund O'Brien) inflitrates the gang. The finale...

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