The Public Enemy

This article is about the 1931 film. For other uses, see Public enemy (disambiguation).

The Public Enemy
theatrical poster
Directed by	William A. Wellman
Produced by	Darryl F. Zanuck
Written by	Kubec Glasmon John Bright
Screenplay by	Harvey F. Thew
Based on	Beer and Blood by John Bright and Kubec Glasmon
Starring	James Cagney Jean Harlow Edward Woods Joan Blondell Mae Clarke
Music by	David Mendoza
Cinematography	Devereaux Jennings
Editing by	Ed McCormick
Distributed by	Warner Bros.
Release date(s)	April 23, 1931 (1931-04-23)
Running time	83 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$151,000

The Public Enemy (released as Enemies of the Public in the United Kingdom) is a 1931 American Pre-Code crime film starring James Cagney and directed by William A. Wellman. The film relates the story of a young man's rise in the criminal underworld in prohibition-era urban America. The supporting players include Jean Harlow, Edward Woods, Joan Blondell, Beryl Mercer, Donald Cook, and Mae Clarke. The screenplay is based on a never-published novel by two former street thugs — Beer and Blood by John Bright and Kubec Glasmon — who had witnessed some of Al Capone’s murderous gang rivalries in Chicago.

The Public Enemy was selected in 1998 for preservation in the United States National Film Registry, as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."

Plot

After Tom Powers (James Cagney) and his childhood friend, Matt Doyle (Edward Woods), grow into young adults, the film follows them as they gradually progress from small crimes (such as stealing watches from a department store as children) to worse crimes (such as killing a policeman during a botched robbery attempt as teenagers), after being hired by local bootlegger Paddy Ryan (Robert Emmett O'Connor). Tom quickly rises from apprentice to leading gangster by being more vicious and ruthless than his rivals. The bootlegging business becomes an ever more lucrative operation, and Tom and Matt are not shy about flaunting the trappings of gangsterism. Tom does not forget about his more humble origins, and offers support to his pathetically doting, and now widowed, mother. This brings him into conflict with his older brother, Mike Powers (Donald Cook), a shell-shocked war veteran who strongly disapproves of his loathsome little brother. Arguably underlying the fraternal conflict is that Tom’s vicious immorality has brought generous material rewards while the straight-and-narrow path chosen by his brother has only produced a bitter casualty of war. Tom considers Mike self-righteous and hypocritical. When Mike quips that Tom's success is based on nothing more than “beer and blood” (the title of the book upon which the film is based), Tom retorts that “Your hands ain't so clean. You killed and liked it. You didn't get them medals for holding hands with them Germans.”

Tom continues his rise in gangland, but eventually his greed catches up with him when he challenges another gang, precipitating a catastrophic gang war. Arguably, the most famous scene is Tom “getting it” in the end, graphically setting the tone for the “crime doesn’t pay” theme that dominated crime films for the rest of the decade and beyond.

Cast (in credits order)

• James Cagney as Tom Powers
• Jean Harlow as Gwen Allen
• Edward Woods as Matt Doyle
• Joan Blondell as Mamie
• Donald Cook as Mike Powers
• Leslie Fenton as Nails Nathan
• Beryl Mercer as Ma Powers
• Robert Emmett O'Connor as Paddy Ryan
• Murray Kinnell as Putty Nose
• Mae Clarke as Kitty

Uncredited cast members include Frank Coghlan, Jr., Frankie Darro, Snitz Edwards, Douglas Gerrard, Robert Homans, Eddie Kane, Helen Parrish, Mia Marvin, Lee Phelps, Russ Powell, Sam McDaniel, Purnell Pratt and Lucille Ward.

Production

Many of the characters in the film were based on actual people. Edward Woods was originally cast in the lead role until director Wellman decided Cagney would be more effective in the part and switched the two actors. Another reason for the switch is that the sound technology used in The Public Enemy was superior to that used in earlier films, making it no longer imperative to have an actor in the lead role with impeccable enunciation.^{[citation needed]} Although it was still a risk giving Cagney the starring role, his distinctive interpretation of the character, especially his machine-gun speaking style, was now technically feasible. Cagney was also short and seemed uncouth, compared to the typical finesse of a more conventionally cinegenic actor like Woods, helping to establish Warner Brothers' reputation for films that explicitly targeted working class audiences during the Great Depression. At the time of the role switch, Woods was promised by the studio that it would be made up to him with later assignments but this was never followed through and Woods subsequently fell into obscurity. Also, the childhood scenes with Cagney's and Woods' characters were never reshot with the children switched, confusing viewers for generations.

Principal filming took place in January and February 1931.

In the scene where Mike Powers punches his brother Tom, director Wellman privately took Donald Cook aside and, explaining his desire for authenticity in "Tom's" reaction, asked the actor to really hit Cagney. Cook played his part a bit too well, and he struck Cagney in the mouth with such force, he actually broke one of his teeth.^{[citation needed]} Yet in spite of his genuine shock and pain, Cagney stayed in character and played out the rest of the scene. In another incident, live ammunition was used in a scene where Tom Powers ducks around the corner of a building to take cover from machine gun fire; the use of live ammunition was common practice at the time.^{[citation needed]} The bullets struck the wall of the building at the position where Cagney's head had been just a moment prior.

Grapefruit scene

A controversial scene in which Tom (James Cagney) angrily smashes a half grapefruit into his girlfriend's face (Mae Clarke).

In a 1973 interview featured in the Turner Classic Movies documentary The Men Who Made The Movies: William Wellman, Wellman said he added the grapefruit "hitting" to the scene, because when he and his wife at the time would get into fights, she would never talk or give any expression. Since she always had a grapefruit for breakfast, he always wanted to put the grapefruit into her face just to get a reaction out of her, so she would show some emotion; he felt that this scene gave him the opportunity to rid himself of that temptation. Some, such as film critic Ben Mankiewicz, have asserted that Mae Clarke's surprised and seemingly somewhat angry reaction to the grapefruit was genuine, as she hadn't been told to expect the unscripted action. In her autobiography, Clarke stated that Cagney had told her prior to that take what he planned to do. She said she was surprised to see the grapefruit take of the scene appear in the final film, as it had been her understanding that they were shooting it only as a joke to amuse the crew. According to Cagney, Clarke's ex-husband had the grapefruit scene timed, and would buy a ticket just before that scene went onscreen, go enjoy the scene, leave, then come back during the next show just in time to see only that scene again.

Prologue and epilogue

The film featured a prologue "apprising the audience that the hoodlums and terrorists of the underworld must be exposed and the glamour ripped from them" and an epilogue "pointing the moral that civilization is on her knees and inquiring loudly as to what is to be done." At the film's premiere in New York City, the film's prologue was preceded by a "brief stage tableau, with sinuous green lighting, which shows a puppet gangster shooting another puppet gangster in the back."

Music

The soundtrack included the following songs:

• "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles"
• "Hesitation Blues"
• "Toot Toot Tootsie (Goodbye)"
• "Maple Leaf Rag"
• "Brighten the Corner Where You Are"
• "Smiles"
• "I Surrender Dear"

The music was performed by the Vitaphone Orchestra, led by conductor David Mendoza.

Reception

At Rotten Tomatoes, The Public Enemy all 26 of the critics reviewing the film gave it a "fresh" rating. Andre Sennwald, who reviewed the film for The New York Times upon its April 1931 release, called it "just another gangster film at the Strand, weaker than most in its story, stronger than most in its acting, and, like most, maintaining a certain level of interest through the last burst of machine-gun fire"; Woods and Cagney give "remarkably lifelike portraits of young hoodlums" and "Beryl Mercer as Tom's mother, Robert Emmett O'Connor as a gang chief, and Donald Cook as Tom's brother, do splendidly." Time magazine called The Public Enemy "well-told" and noted "Unlike City Streets, this is not a Hugoesque fable of gangsters fighting among themselves, but a documentary drama of the bandit standing against society. It carries to its ultimate absurdity the fashion for romanticizing gangsters, for even in defeat the public enemy is endowed with grandeur." Variety called it "low-brow material given such workmanship as to make it high-brow" which attempts to "square everything [with] a foreword and postscript moralizing on the gangster as a menace to the public welfare."

A theatre in Times Square ran The Public Enemy 24 hours a day during its initial release.

At the 4th Academy Awards, the film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Story, losing to The Dawn Patrol.

Subsequent recognition

In 1989, an animatronics version of a scene from The Public Enemy was incorporated into The Great Movie Ride at the Disney-MGM Studios theme part in Orlando, Florida.

In 1998, The Public Enemy was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". In 2003 the character of Tom Powers was among the AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes and Villains, placing 42nd in the villain list. In 2008, the film appeared on one of the AFI's 10 Top 10 lists—the best ten films in ten "classic" American film genres. The Public Enemy was listed as the eighth best in the gangster film genre.

Re-releases

The film was re-released in 1941 after the Production Code was put into effect. Three scenes of the film were cut because of the Code. One is of a markedly effeminate tailor measuring Tom for a suit, another with Matt and Mamie "rolling around" in bed, and the third showing Tom being seduced when hiding out in a woman's apartment.

The film was also re-released in 1954, with a written prologue added before the opening credits, advising that gangsters such as Tom Powers and Caesar "Rico" Bandello, the title character in Little Caesar (played by Edward G. Robinson), are a menace that the public must confront.

See also

• List of crime films of the 1930s

External links

• The Public Enemy at the Internet Movie Database
• The Public Enemy at Rotten Tomatoes