CATCH A CLASSIC
White Heat (1949)
MOVIES!, 11:15 p.m.
James Cagney, who became a star nearly 20 years earlier with a legendary breakthrough performance in another memorable crime flick, The Public Enemy, gives an equally iconic turn in this Oscar-nominated 1949 gangster classic as coldblooded Cody Jarrett, a psychotic thug devoted to his hardboiled Ma (Margaret Wycherly). Bracingly directed by Raoul Walsh, this fast-paced film noir tracing Jarrett’s violent life in and out of jail is also a harrowing character study. Jarrett is a psychological time bomb ruled by impulse — he murders a wounded accomplice and revels in the act, neglects his sultry wife (Virginia Mayo) and adores his doting mother. It is among the most vivid screen performances of Cagney’s career and shows that when it came to portraying such characters, the actor was “top of the world!”