Great Guy (1936) or, Incorruptible!

12/28/2020

Great Guy (1936) or, Incorruptible!

♥♥

A smudge-like shade beside James Cagney's large head indicates something dark and ominous on this strong poster for John G. Blystone's Great Guy

A fresh card in New York's beleaguered Department of Weights and Means makes himself unpopular around town by being decent and skilled at clearing up scams, - and unbribable to boot.

Great Guy is written by Henry McCarthy (Silent Pal (1925)) and Henry Johnson (Wild Gold (1934)), with Harry Ruskin (Keeping Company (1940)) contributing dialog, based on James Edward Grant's (Angel and the Badman (1947)) Johnnie Cave stories from the Saturday Evening Post magazine in 1933-34, and directed by John G. Blystone (On Again, Off Again Finnegan (1914, short)).

James Cagney (The Roaring Twenties (1939)) acts with imposing physicality here in a film that is a banal and minor flick, which I saw in an inferior public domain copy. Great Guy is short and half-baked.

Perhaps the best part of Great Guy is the line Cagney delivers to his secretarial flirt, when he finds himself in deep trouble, and she wears an impressive hat: "At a time like this, you wear a hat like that?" - Priceless.

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: Unknown

Box office: Reportedly 2.1 mil. $ (North America only)

= Uncertain, but likely a big hit

[Great Guy was released in December (USA) and runs 66 minutes. Shooting took place in California. Cagney was paid 100k $ for his performance. The film was the first of two films he made for Grand International Picture, breaking off his contract with Warner Bros. After the second film, musical Something to Sing About (1937), which flopped and helped cause the closing of the company by 1940, Cagney returned to Warner Bros.. If Great Guy was made on a realistic 0.5 mil. $ budget, the film would rank as a big hit based on the domestic gross alone. The film is in public domain and can be seen free and legally right here. Blystone returned with 23½ Hours Leave (1937). Cagney returned in Something to Sing About (1937). 867 IMDb users have given Great Guy a 6.3/10 average rating.]

What do you think of Great Guy?

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12/28/2020

Great Guy (1936) or, Incorruptible!

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