The Roaring Twenties

Technically a period film spanning from World War I through the end of Prohibition (passing through bobbed hair, speakeasies, and Tommy guns), Raoul Walsh’s The Roaring Twenties possesses early noir contours, but its emphasis on characters and relationships makes it first and foremost a drama, and a brilliant one at that. It’s the story of three men building their lives after escaping death together in the trenches: George Halley (Humphrey Bogart) is the bad influence, Lloyd Hart (Jeffrey Lynn) is the good influence, and Eddie Bartlett (James Cagney) is stuck in the middle, struggling against moral instability (and violent outbursts) like a classic noir anti-hero. Having dispersed at the war’s end, the trio reunite years later to profit from the criminal underground during Prohibition; Bartlett’s rejection by employers and dwindling self-esteem engender the pathos that justifies his descent. Two women of integrity, the sweet, young Jean (Priscilla Lane) and the wise, weathered Panama (Gladys George), keep Eddie from losing his humanity, if not his shirt, while Bogart’s sadism remains irredeemable (“I think I’ll take this with me,” he says, caressing his gun the moment peace is announced.) Noir expressionism springs up at the midpoint, when Halley’s ship of booze is hijacked, and sticks around to varying degrees through the film’s dramatic crescendo on the church steps. “He used to be a big shot.”