Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

A Disappointing Continuation

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

Leila Bennett's droning was endless, intrusive, grating, and monotonous. She single-handedly ruined every scene in which she was featured, and there were far too many of those; oh, what a Fanny Brice or Judy Holliday could have done with this role! Also, Loretta's character forgiving Cagney's at the end of the movie is reprehensible and stomach-turning - all women should hate this facile and callous resolution. Cagney's character had absolutely no redeeming qualities. And how the hell did he get away with attempted murder? Definitely not my favourite Cagney vehicle although I really, really liked Loretta Young despite the ending foisted upon her.

These old 30's gangster type movies are some of my favorites and this one started out on the right foot up until the 3nd banana waitress opened her mouth and fractured my eardrums. I had to turn this off. There's only so much shrill whiny Bronx Brooklyn whatever crybaby yapping I can tolerate before pulling out my heater and pumping a couple rounds into the TV.Loretta was very hot, Cagney was a winner too, but Loretta's roommate/friend had a voice that seriously made me want to fire up the chainsaw. Even Cagney told her to button her lip, to no avail. There was just no shutting this chick up. Talk about single-handedly ruining what otherwise seemed like a very good movie ....how bout springing for some voice lessons Honey!

Something better than Taxi should have been given for a film in the one and only teaming of screen legends James Cagney and Loretta Young. It's a typical Thirties Warner Brothers potboiler about a taxi cab conglomerate making war on independent hacks. Of course you know that Cagney is the good Irish son of New York City leading the independents against the strong arm tactics of David Landau.Landau is the best thing in Taxi, a real brute of a guy whether he's the head goon of Consolidated Taxi or a hunted fugitive after he kills Cagney's brother.Taxi is just the kind of stuff that Cagney was trying so hard to get away from, scripts like these were what he was constantly battling with Jack Warner over, Cagney wanted better and eventually got it. Young has little to do but be the valiant wife.Who pulls something incredibly stupid in the script. At the beginning her father kills one of the Landau goons and goes to prison and dies there. She doesn't like violence, but I refuse to believe she'd aid Landau just to keep Cagney away from a vengeance killing. I also can't believe that Landau's girl friend Dorothy Burgess would ever approach her with such a loony scheme.George Raft has a bit part as a rival dancer to Cagney in a marathon dance contest. With the dancing background of both these guys, what a missed opportunity it was not to have them in a number together.However Taxi is memorable for one thing. Cagney who learned to speak several languages growing up in the Yorkville section of Manhattan, got a great chance to show off what fluent Yiddish was at his command in a great scene with a potential fare.Straight from Delancey Street, darling.

TAXI (Warner Brothers, 1932), directed by Roy Del Ruth, is not so much a tribute on the day in the life of taxi drivers and the involvement with their passengers, but solely on an individual cabbie out to avenge his brother's killer. While the story does start out with a taxi war, Gramercy vs. Consolidated Cabs, it shifts gears during its second half where the theme switches from "fare game" to "revenge is sweet." The cabbie in question is James Cagney, resident tough guy of Warners, still in the driver's seat after his triumph in THE PUBLIC ENEMY (1931). He's not a gangster this time around but a guy on the side of the law, his law in fact, coping with hostility from others which cause his temper to constantly reach its boiling point. Loretta Young, very early in her career, plays the girl he marries who tries every which way to break him out of his quick-temper habit.TAXI immediately gets underway as Buck Gerard (David Landau) an organizer who leads his men to create "accidents" for other taxi drivers in order to do away with his competition. He orders "Pop" Reilly (Guy Kibbee) to leave his corner, but when he refuses, has his hired truck driver (Nat Pendleton) smash into his taxi. Reilly shoots the driver, but because he took the law into his own hands, the old man is sentenced to serve ten years in the state penitentiary in Ossining. After Reilly dies, Sue (Loretta Young), his daughter, goes against Matt Nolan (James Cagney), a taxi driver forming a staff meeting in getting the other drivers to unite by fighting back. In spite of their differences, Matt and Sue eventually marry. While in a night club celebrating their union, the Nolans encounter the drunken Buck Gerard with his girlfriend, Marie Costa (Dorothy Burgess). After Buck speaks out of turn, sort to speak, by insulting Sue, a fight ensues causing Gerard to take out his knife aimed at Matt, but accidentally stabbing his brother, Danny (Ray Cooke), in his attempt to save Matt. While Sue feels it best for the police to handle the situation, Matt wants nothing more than to avenge Danny's killer. Their marriage nearly comes at wits end when Matt learns Skeets (George E. Stone), one of his taxi driver pals, that Gerard's girl was seen visiting Sue in his apartment, asking her for $100, leading Matt to believe Sue has betrayed him, unaware of her true reason in doing this.A forgotten 67 minute programmer with fast-pace action is notable mostly for a couple of memorable scenes: Cagney speaking Yiddish to a policeman, and a dance contest at the Rainbow Gardens involving Cagney and Young with another dancing couple, the male partner being the up and coming George Raft. With this being a Cagney picture, it is Leila Bennett as Young's best girlfriend who not only stands out with her comedy relief and witty dialog, but gets the final fadeout. Look fast for Donald Cook (Cagney's brother in THE PUBLIC ENEMY) and Evalyn Knapp in the movie theater sequence playing leading players of "Her Hour of Love." As with many movies of the early 1930s, TAXI has gone through the remaking process by the end of the decade under the new title and locale as WATERFRONT (WB, 1939) with Gloria Dickson and Dennis Morgan, both films that have never been distributed on video or DVD. For a quick joy ride, be sure to watch TAXI next the time this and WATERFRONT shows again on Turner Classic Movies. (***)