| Angels with Dirty Faces | |
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Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Michael Curtiz |
| Produced by | Samuel Bischoff |
| Written by | Rowland Brown John Wexley Warren Duff Ben Hecht (uncredited) Charles MacArthur (uncredited) |
| Starring | James Cagney Pat O'Brien The Dead End Kids Humphrey Bogart Ann Sheridan George Bancroft |
| Music by | Max Steiner |
| Cinematography | Sol Polito |
| Editing by | Owen Marks |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. |
| Release date(s) | November 24, 1938 |
| Running time | 97 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Angels with Dirty Faces is a 1938 American gangster film directed by Michael Curtiz and starring James Cagney, Pat O'Brien, the Dead End Kids and Humphrey Bogart, along with Ann Sheridan and George Bancroft. The film was written by Rowland Brown, John Wexley and Warren Duff with uncredited assistance from Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur.
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Rocky Sullivan (James Cagney) and Jerry Connolly (Pat O'Brien) are childhood friends who robbed a railroad car as kids. Rocky saved Jerry's life during the chase by pulling him out of the way of a steam train while running from the guards that saw them. Rocky was then caught by the police, but Jerry - who could run faster - escaped. Rocky, after being sent to reform school, grows up to become a notorious gangster, while Jerry has become a priest.
Rocky returns to his old neighborhood, where Jerry is the Parish Priest and intends to keep young boys away from a life of crime. Six of those boys, Soapy (Billy Halop), Swing (Bobby Jordan), Bim (Leo Gorcey), Patsy (Gabriel Dell), Crabface (Huntz Hall), and Hunky (Bernard Punsly), idolize Rocky, and Jerry attempts to keep his former friend from corrupting them. (These boys were to star in Dead End Kids/East Side Kids/The Bowery Boys films).
Meanwhile Rocky gets involved with Frazier (Humphrey Bogart), a crooked lawyer, and Keefer (George Bancroft), a shady businessman and municipal contractor. They try to dispose of Rocky, but he finds the record book that they keep where they list the bribes to city officials. Jerry learns of these events and warns Rocky to leave before he informs the authorities. Rocky ignores his advice and Jerry gets the public's attention and informs them all of the crooked government, causing Frazier and Keefer to plot to kill him. Rocky overhears this plot and kills them to protect his childhood friend.
Rocky is then captured following an elaborate shootout in a building, and sentenced to die. Jerry visits him just before his execution and asks him to do him one last favor - to die pretending to be a screaming, sniveling coward, which would end the boys' idolization of him. Rocky refuses, and insists he will be "tough" to the end, and not give up the one thing he has left, his pride. At the very last moment he appears to change his mind and has to be dragged to the electric chair (whether his cries are genuine or done to simply fulfill Jerry's favor is left to the viewer's imagination). The boys hear about what happened and decide he was a coward. Then Father Jerry asks them to say a prayer with him, "for a boy who couldn't run as fast as I could".
James Cagney won the 1939 New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actor for his role. In addition, the film was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Actor in a Leading Role (James Cagney), Best Director and Best Writing, Original Story.
Angels with Dirty Faces was nominated for AFI's Top 10 Gangster Films list.[1]
When first offered the project, Cagney's agent was convinced that his star property would never consent to playing a role where he would be depicted as an abject coward being dragged to his execution. Cagney, however, was enthusiastic about the chance to play Rocky. He saw it as a suitable vehicle to prove to critics and front office honchos that he had a broad acting range that extended far beyond tough guy roles. Bogart, for one, was very impressed by the death house scene and informed Cagney as such.
Angels With Dirty Faces was dramatized as a radio play on the May 22, 1939 broadcast of Lux Radio Theater, with James Cagney and Pat O'Brien reprising their film roles.
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