Gangster Watch: The Public Enemy (1931)

Watched:  08/07/2026

Format:  TCM on DVR

Viewing:  First, as it turns out

Director:  William A. Wellman

I was positive I'd seen The Public Enemy (1931) either in film school or a few years after.  For your purposes - I had never seen this movie, and I am genuinely surprised by this fact.  I do like a genre deep dive and this is a classic.

On reflection, I am positive I've seen Little Caesar (I remember the "is this the end of Rico?" bit), but far less so that I've seen Scarface.  But I will likely give those a spin soon as those movies, along with The Public Enemy, were the breakout crime movies that basically locked in gangster pictures as part of the talkie-era.

The movie is Pre-Code, and I'm sure if I looked it up, sure seems like it would have helped drive the creation of the Code.  There's some straight up sexual allusions in the movie, violence that surpasses what would come later, and despite the book-ends on the film assuring the audience that "this is bad!  We're not glamorizing these people!" it's absolutely at least making a life of crime seem exciting while it lasts.

Tom Powers is a kid when we meet he and his pal, Matt Doyle.  Tom is the son of a cop, but also a shady kid who is already trying to grift a little and a bit of a shitty guy.  He's basically got a Fagan who is involving him in petty crime.  Flash forward, and Tom (James Cagney) and Matt (Edward Woods) are given their first heist, which goes sideways.  

Shortly after, with the passing of Prohibition, they get involved with moving hooch - and, yes, the movie makes no bones about painting Prohibition as a very stupid move and has no problems showing how crime thrives in a world where you cut people off from legally obtaining something they feel a right to.  And we learned that lesson and never, ever did it again and that's why there's no organized crime today.

I am unsure if this is the movie that laid out the template for following young crooks up the ladder until they become top of the heap, things go sideways, and they meet their fall, but it sure is a thing.  Once Upon a Time in America, Goodfellas, and arguably the Godfather Trilogy follow the pattern.  Mixing drama, melodrama, some romance and punctuated by violence - gangster movies kind of have it all.  The stories are far from uniquely American, but they do speak to what was The American Dream and how it has a flipside.  

Cagney would go on to play a weird mix of characters over the years, between being a song-and-dance man in stuff like Yankee Doodle Dandy, he also laid the foundations here of playing the sociopath who will feel almost zero remorse over turning his back on family itself as he considers their law-abiding, home & hearth ways small-minded.  This is the same character made famous by squashing a grapefruit in a girl's face for just speaking up for what she wants.

no, Jimmy!  Use your words!

More surprising to me was that what leads up to the scene makes clear Tom and Matt are living in sin with their girlfriends.  Even in the grittiest noir, you rarely see this show up in movies.  The girls always seem to have their own place.  

The movie features Jean Harlow up front and center as the woman Tom falls for - and the part is smaller than I figured, but still key.  In another supporting part is played by Joan Blondell, and you can tell both are stars.

Anyway, I was stunned by parts of the film.  Yes, it's been copied and echoed for so long that in 2026 - this near century-old movie can feel a tad predictable but that's not a criticism.  As watchable as this film is *now*, I can just imagine how it felt in 1931.  It must have been really something.  But it does have some genuine surprises and Cagney really is electric - a sort of perfect player for this new sound era where we're now caring as much or more about how people say what they say, and does it resonate for a broad audience?

It's always great to not just check off a classic from my punch list, but to actually really enjoy it?  Pretty good stuff.