The greatest movie ever!

There is definitely an excellent idea hidden in the background of the film. Unfortunately, it's difficult to find it.

Yes, absolutely, there is fun to be had, as well as many, many things to go boom, all amid an atmospheric urban jungle.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Metal worker James Cagney is humiliated by naval officer Pat O'Brien. So he joins the Navy to get even with him. Naturally. Then he falls in love with Pat's sister, only he doesn't know it's Pat's sister. Their romance may be short-lived, however, because Jimmy and Pat can't stand one another.Cagney and O'Brien made a lot of these types of movies. This was the first and one of the best. Usually Jimmy's the cocky jerk and Pat's the nice guy. That's sort of the case here, too, but I actually found myself liking Cagney more than O'Brien. He's fun and likable, even if he's not always right. Pat, on the other hand, is a sour puss throughout the movie. Gloria Stuart plays O'Brien's sister who Cagney falls in love with. She's very pretty and does a fine job in a part that requires very little. Historically important for being partially filmed on board the USS Arizona, which was destroyed at Pearl Harbor seven years later. Also some footage of the dirigible USS Macon, which crashed the year after this film was released. It's a fun movie that fans of the stars will certainly enjoy. The climax is implausible but exciting. There is a blackface gag that will set some today back on their heels, so be prepared for that.

The only existing (to my knowledge) motion pictures of the USS Arizona BEFORE December 7, 1941. For that alone, this movie rates 15 stars. Cagney and O'Brien aren't bad either...but I was fascinated by the ship and the crew, man of whom lost their lives (and are still aboard)several years later. I do have a DVD of this movie (B&W of course) and I treasure it greatly. I wish this was widely available to modelers who now have an opportunity to make a replica of the Arizona in the large 1/200 scale! (also 1/526, 1/700, 1/350). The details of armament, decks, structure, hull, etc. are an extraordinary opportunity for research.What an incredible opportunity to see this piece of history!

This is more fun than you might expect. Not the romance, which is dull and familiar. A swabbie (Cagney) falls for the daughter of a Chief Boatswain's Mate (O'Brien) and the two guys hate each other. They always seem to be stationed together. And Cagney's character is equally familiar -- the tough, selfish cynic who joins the Navy on a dare and finds himself stuck. He proves himself a hero, of course, as all these characters do, as Cagney himself was to do a few years later in "The Fighting 69th." That's all boring. What's fun and interesting are the locations. Usually a story like this is shot on relatively cheap cardboard sets with some inserted footage of Navy ships. See "Follow the Fleet", inter alia, for an example.Here, though, as other commentators have pointed out, the shooting was done on the decks of the real USS Arizona and there is considerable footage of the dirigible Macon, which was housed at Moffet Field near Palo Alto, California. The monstrous hangars are still there.The first time Cagney demonstrates his altruism is while the Arizona is on fleet maneuvers off San Diego. It's genuine heroism too. A powder bag leaks and a fire threatens the entire turret. Cagney throws himself on the burning powder to smother it. There was a similar explosion in the turret of the battleship USS Iowa in 1989 that damaged much of the turret and killed 47 crewmen. (The Navy blamed it on a homosexual spat.) I may be biased because I was on a ship that took part in fleet maneuvers off San Diego too. I was a lowly lookout with no real responsibility and enjoyed every minute of watching guns go off in the sunshine. My ship, the Coast Guard Cutter Gresham, was supposed to track a submarine on sonar but couldn't find the submarine in the first place so the exercise was a flop. I won't bother to describe the farce that followed the announcement of "Air action, port!" Where was I? I wish someone would discretely flap a napkin at me when I got off topic like that. I'd do as much for you. Anyway, the second time Cagney indulges in heroics is a charm. He gets the girl, saves O'Brien, and wins another medal, I guess.Cagney is his usual bouncy self, sneering and ready to bop everybody on the schnozz. O'Brien is reliable and unexciting. Gloria Stuart, who passed on recently, is less than inspiring. Frank McHugh lends solid support. I could hardly believe it when I saw Bill Elliot as a Navy officer. Ten years later he would make a series of cheap Westerns and serials as "Wild Bill Elliot," one of my faves when I was a kid.At any rate, and for whatever reason, I expected to be rather more bored than I was. Nice crisp photography.

Besides James Cagney and Pat O'Brien, there's also beautiful Gloria Stuart (63 years before her triumphant return to the screen in Titanic (1997)) as the love interest, and Frank McHugh providing comedy centered around his mother's false teeth. In a fight over a girl with Navy man O'Brien, Cagney is knocked out when his girl distracts him. And when O'Brien later steals his girl, Cagney is so angry he joins the Navy with the hope of getting even. Talk about holding grudges! After 3 months of basic training (shot on location at the Naval Training Station in San Diego, California), Cagney is assigned to the battleship U.S.S. Arizona, the ship O'Brien is on. The Navy allowed location shooting on the actual ship, which is the same one sunk at Pearl Harbor and is now in the harbor as a memorial. It's an impressive ship with unbelievable firepower and we see the big guns being loaded and fired in maneuvers. Meanwhile, Cagney had met and wooed Stuart, but she turned out to be O'Brien's sister! And O'Brien caused a rift, another reason for Cagney to get even with him. Because of a bad attitude problem, Cagney eventually is transferred to the dirigible U.S.S. Macon at Sunnyvale, California. Again, the actual airship is used and it is an awesome sight as it is pulled out of its hangar, dwarfing everything in view. As luck (and the script) would have it, the ship tries to land in windy weather but aborts, with O'Brien hanging on to a mooring line as it gains altitude. Cagney disobeys orders and climbs down the rope with a parachute to try to save the man he doesn't yet know is O'Brien.