when it come out and this be pretty much state of the art musical film entertainment . to this day it more entertaining than most and in great part because it have james cagney in the lead role a a musical prologue producer under a succession of deadline and shelter from all storm by his trusty girl friday play by joan blondell . also the musical number towards the end which be put together by busby berkeley be pretty much a knock out as far a that type of thing go . but this be a pretty strange movie . i mean in one of those number and you have get billy barty run around pretend to be a lovable toddler and do all kind of weird stuff . ruby keeler seem to have a sickening smile plaster on her face at all time and but at least she not require to act like in some of her late unfortunate film . you would never guess that dick powell be any kind of tough guy from see him in this movie while apparently all the tough guy energy be allocate to the star cagney . a for cagney and his high speed rant about musical show and so forth be endear and annoy at the same time . after a while it get a bit too much . you expect him to walk out and say and hey . i have get a great idea for a prologue . the woman be cigarette and and they come out of a pack of smoke . oh no and we do that one last month . it funny but it get a bit repetitive . in the moment where he have to get tough with the bad girl and ruth donnelly and some of the establish cagney gangster character come out . in fact frequent b gangster director william keighley be credit here with dialogue coaching and and it seem at time that cagney and blondell be invoke something very street even though the character aren not criminal . the musical number . what can you say . they stand alone a entertainment and the way that berkeley use the human body and geometry be really startling . but none of them really mean anything . it mean honeymoon hotel and nothing really more or less . and the whole pretense of the integration fall apart immediately and since the character in the show be do thing that couldn not possibly be appreciate by a theater audience like the movie portrays . for example at one point they show the fine print on a newspaper and thing like that . the whole thing could only exist on film and so the idea that the prologue be actually live show be ridiculous . i can only suppose that audience of the time be somewhat less critical about thing like this than they would be ten year later or so and because this be a very polished production . it great to see cagney himself show off his superb dance skill and and he can actually share the stage with a dancer like keeler . cagney and blondell have excellent chemistry and their scene go off really well . the music i would say be only mediocre and but mostly please if repetitive . bacon direction in general be very suitable but never interesting . the film entertainment value be unquestionable and it have also pick up some nostalgic value along the way . it a cut above most let put on a show film of the 30 .