“Angels with Dirty Faces” is a Crime Drama, screenplay by John Wexley and Warren Duff, from a story by Rowland Brown and Directed by Michael Curtiz.
It’s the story of two
boyhood friends, Rocky Sullivan (James Cagney) and Jerry Connolly (Pat O'Brien)
who were running from the police one night when Rocky was caught.
After he was arrested
he went into the prison system and became a lifelong criminal, while Jerry went
straight and became a Catholic Priest and ministered to people in the same
neighbourhood where he and Rocky grew up.
When Rocky is released
from prison after his latest term he resumes his criminal lifestyle and is hero
worshipped by many of the local kids.
Jerry is worried that
the kids will follow Rocky down the wrong path into the criminal world, and
works hard to keep them on the straight and narrow.
But no matter what he
says he can’t get through to them, even after Rocky is convicted of murder and
sentenced to the electric chair, so Jerry visits him on death row and asks him
for one last favour.
A classic of the
genre, with extraordinary acting by James Cagney, ably complimented by Pat
O'Brien as his friend, Humphrey Bogart who is the perfect actor as the arch
villain, and the radiant Ann Sheridan adds a feminine touch.
