Just perfect...

An action-packed slog

Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Blondell is the perfect match for Cagney. Both are brim-full of personality and feisty grit. Here they're sort of on-again off-again sweeties; that is, when Bert's (Cagney) not working a clever moneymaking scheme. Yes, it's the 30's favorite rags to riches guy working his way up from bellhop to globe trotter. Of course, in true Cagney style, he makes it by ignoring technicalities like the law. But don't expect tommy-guns blasting away. Instead, Bert's an up-and-coming con-man who both scams and gets scammed. I count at least four con-man schemes and maybe more, so you may need a scorecard. But they're clever and hard to see coming. Of course, cheating Cagney's like playing with fire, so someone should tell Louis Calhern (Barker) before he gets burned. And get a load of Calhern's aristocratic nose—I'd love to see him and the equally endowed Basil Rathbone in a scene together. Plus, there're all those colorful old flivvers rolling down the street, which is one reason I like these cinema antiques. Also, I was wondering whether Barker was going to put on Ann's panties or just admire them. And what about his inspecting that brassiere where Ann keeps her valuables. Then again, this is pre-Code 1931. But catch that ending that's a puzzler given the questions left hanging.Anyway, with its typical 30's bundle of energy, Warner Bros. again shows why it was the studio of record, and why Cagney remains truly trans-generational.

The wide eyed Joan Blondell was one busy actress in the early thirty's, making sometimes a dozen films a year. Playing opposite James Cagney whom she had come from Broadway with to make her film debut in his first film as well, Blondell truly epitomizes the Depression era jazz baby, pre-code leading lady. Even playing gold diggers, she always had a huge heart of gold beneath the surface, and ultimately her characters are always looking for true love even though they had their eyes set on expensive purse strings. She plays a maid in a fancy hotel, and becomes involved in Cagney's schemes of getting rich quickly, but as those games continue to blow up in his face, she wises up to him, and sets her sights elsewhere. But in the course of true love, he does finally learn some common sense, and begins to see the cute Blondell as more than just an easy mark for his lecherous moves.If the lost film "Convention City" is any indication of why the code came in, then the earlier made "Blonde Crazy" is definitely one of the films that led the Catholic legion of decency to create such a movement in making films less scandalous. There is a famous shot of Blondell in thus film seemingly naked in a bathtub with Cagney coming in, looking for her money, to which she tells him that it in her underwear. Cagney goes outside and begins fondling her bra and panties, and seemingly having way too much of a good time. Guy Kibbee, playing a lecherous customer, also makes unwanted advances at her, and her responses to his pass are nothing short of genius. Blondell was an actress way ahead of her time, and up there with Barbara Stanwyck, Ginger Rogers and Jean Harlow comes off as someone that any guy would not only want to have as his pal, but ultimately hope to settle down with as well. Maude Eburne is very funny as Blondell's boss, with veteran character actor Charles Lane in one of his first films, playing the type of grouchy curmudgeon that would make him a fan favorite for almost the next 70 years. The plot line goes a bit astray with the Louis Calhern character as the film goes on, but the sassy script never lets up and with great leads and an early appearance by Ray Milland, this is one pre-code film that is definitely worth catching.

Who knew that when James Cagney and Joan Blondell started out in the quite dramatic "Sinner's Holiday" they were going to be remembered (as a team) for smart and snappy vehicles like "Blonde Crazy" and "Footlight Parade". As usual, at the Warner's factory, Joan, who had only started out in films the year before, had already made 12 movies by the time she appeared in "Blonde Crazy". From best friend duty in "The Office Wife" and "Millie" to eye catching moments in "Night Nurse", she called herself a "studio dame"!!This movie ticks all the right boxes, being a funny, sexy, slap happy romp with a sprinkling of pathos at the end. "A leading hotel in a small mid western city" is where Cagney, as Bert, struts his stuff - as resident bell hop, part time bootlegger and full time "blonde watcher". When he gets Ann (Blondell) a job as a maid, he expects some payment but she is strictly A.P.O (ain't puttin' out!! - see "Other Men's Women") - except with the slaps which she delivers with gusto!! She wants real love and commitment and she doesn't think she will find it with Bert. Wisecracks fly thick and fast - "the age of chivalry is dead, this is the age of chiselry"!!!They finally form a working partnership and when Rupert Johnson Jnr. (Guy Kibbee) comes to the hotel and seems keen on Ann, the stage is set for an elaborate hoax with Nat Pendleton doubling as a conscientious cop, Ann as a lady in distress and Burt as an eager to help witness. This little piece of work nets them $5,000 and with it they flee to "the leading hotel at a big city" where Bert falls in with Dan Barker and Helen (Louis Calhern and Noel Francis) a pair of racketeering con artists who suck Bert into a phoney counterfeiting trick - needless to say Bert gets fleeced!! Meanwhile Ann meets and falls for Joe Reynolds (an extremely young Ray Milland), a debonair young fellow who works for a New York brokerage firm but it is a case of better the con man you know than the crook you don't.There are so many little cons Ann and Bert get up to - the movie is so much fun (there is even a spontanious little dance Cagney does when he and Joan go out for a night on the town). Ann even works out her own little scheme to get even with Dan - "where's Helen", "Oh, I sent her packing", "so she was strictly on the installment plan", "yes and all I forked out was the down payment"!!! There was nothing cheap about Noel Francis, even though she spent most of her career playing gangster's girls. She was a Follies girl and first came to the movies in a musical "Movietone Follies of 1930" where she even sang a song!! She made her last movie in 1937, in a Buck Jones western "Sudden Bill Dorn" and then seemed to vanish off the face of the earth. Try as I might, I can't find out anything about her but with her luminous blonde beauty she deserved a bigger career.

How would you like to go to a hotel and find out James Cagney is the #1 bell-hop, and Joan Blondell is your blond chamber-maid? That's where we start in "Blonde Crazy", and things get wild in a hurry. Cagney plays con-man Bert Harris, and he falls hard for the new chamber-maid, Ann Roberts, played by Joan Blondell. Peggy, another cute chambermaid, warns Ann to stay away from Bert. Ann says, "He can't be interested in me, I'm not important and I have no money." Peggy shoots back, "Oh yeah ... maybe you've got something else he wants." Bert makes a pass at Ann, and get his face slapped hard. When he next sees her he says, "I'm so stuck on you, I wouldn't mind getting slugged by you every day." Ann says, "Oh yeah," smiles, and hauls off and hits him again. Hold on, she's just warming up. Middle aged Guy Kibbee falls hard for Ann, and asks Bert, "What do you know about the blond chambermaid?" Bert smiles and sells the chump a bottle of booze at triple the price, knowing Kibbee will pay because he's been told, "It's the only stuff the blond chamber-maid drinks." After Ann and Bert rip off Kibbee big time, they head for the city and tangle with super chisler "Dapper Dan Barker", played to the hilt by Louis Calhern. Things get rough, with the con-artists ripping off one another, and thumbing their noses at the sap whose been taken at clean-out time. The dialogue is outrageous, and Ann wallops Bert a few more times along the way. Blondell slaps Cagney when he's bad, and slaps him when he's good, only a little softer then and with a big smile, just to let him know she still loves him. At one point Bert starts to walk in on Ann when she's in the tub. She shrieks and yells, "Hey, what's the big idea? I'm taking a bath." To which he cracks, "Oh yeah ... move over!" This is a great film. The only problem is that the ending is way to somber and dark in comparison to the breezy, good-natured tempo of the rest of the film. But this is one you've got to see. Blondell and Cagney are wonderful together.