Gangster films were my favourite genre for years, and they are still up there now. James Cagney has always been synonymous with them, so I have wanted to see why for a while, and White Heat was my first opportunity to do so.
I can see why it has earned classic status. It was pitched at just the right level. The plot is complex and fast moving, but is expressed easily through admirably uncomplicated storytelling which all but guaranteed certain moments the emotional response they were aiming for. The best example of this was the oscillator triangulation plotline; the motive for the police is clear and the method laid out early on. The plan to put it in motion was scuppered, but reformed and when the scene finally takes place, it is guaranteed to work (not just in terms of the logic of the story, but in terms of filmmaking and story delivery/progression) and it does. In a similar way, alot of the plot is laid out for you, but it never felt perfunctory, like needless and cringey plot exposition found in modern lowest common denominator cinema. No effort is made to conceal details for a big reveal or plot twist. I found it very satisfying to find that White Heat contains intelligent characters, all the major and minor act in a way you would expect successful career criminals would.
Cagney clearly does cold, calculating and unhinged very well, and his star power is there to see. His performance was not extraordinary in many ways, yet the man shows the confidence of a star basking in the screen persona they have cultivated through a body of work behind them - not unlike a John Wayne perhaps. He knows what he's there to do, and he does it as good as anyone else.
N.B.
To see an utterly different approach to a cold and calculating gangster portrayal for the ages, see the performance of Richard Attenborough as Pinkie Brown from Brighton Rock a year earlier. It completes it's brief just as well as Cagney's, and it is a performance I prefer, which is just a personal thing.
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