The Public Enemy

They don’t make shoot-’em-up gangster films like they used to. James Cagney gives a landmark performance as Tom Powers, a Prohibition-era bootlegger based on real-life gangsters Charles Dion “Deanie” O’Banion (Al Capone’s archrival) and Earl “Hymie” Weiss, who gets credit for the infamous grapefruit-to-the-face scene. Beyond that citrus-scented notoriety, The Public Enemy has been praised for its early sociological inquiry into the connections between childhood poverty and a life of crime. With its glorification of bootlegging and consorting with floozies, The Public Enemy helped to pave the way for early Hollywood’s strict censors. The film’s most violent acts, however, take place off screen, leaving the gore to the imagination. It could teach Quentin Tarantino a thing or two about subtlety.