Word: cagney
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...Western Cartridge division of the Winchester Repeating Arms company should like "White Heat;" the movie utilizes a good number of its products. During the running of James Cagney's re-entry into the bad-man field, the various principals expend nine 30-30 rifle bullets, three dozen 32 caliber special expanding nose pistol cartridges, one blasting charge, and nine size D tear gas shells...
...Cagney gets rid of at least a dozen of these items all by himself, firing two through a door into the back of his chief officer, and using three more to shoot down another lieutenant who tries to give himself up. The remainder go off at various cops, except for a volley of three which Cagney, calmly munching a sandwich, pumps into a friend who is hiding in the trunk compartment...
Most of this mayhem is instigated by the U. S. Treasury, whose agent seems to be replacing the ubiquitous G-Man as Public Friend Number One. The T-Men are after Cagney for various crimes ranging up to train robbery; he is assisted by his aging mother who is determined that her son should achieve social success. Cagney is less amply helped by Virginia Mayo. Miss Mayo alternates her finely-built presence between an un-Johnston office night-gown and a turtle-neck sweater, between Cagney and the cops and his cohorts, depending how the legal wind is blowing...
...this fails to resurrect the good old days for Mr. Cagney, however. Science and the law have teamed up against him. He is run to cover through a flashing, buzzing combination of spectrographs, portable loudspeakers, walky-talkies, and brand-new Lincolns with loop-antennas projecting through their roofs. Finally caught in an oil refinery, Mr. Cagney is shot down by four more of those fine, accurate rifle bullets. One of the bullets touches off the gas storage tank upon which he is perched, and he dies, laughing like hell. He is probably laughing at all the money Warner Brothers...
...radio in a windswept mountain lideout, and make grey weather, the texture of trees and the vitality of the figures add up to visual pleasure. An unaffected director of home and bedroom scenes, he even manages, without bathos or leer, to jet away with a shot of Cagney sitting on lis mother...