how fickle film history be . to think that this most intense crime thriller have be totally overlooked . i wouldn not say underrated and because it seem that everyone who have watch it agree with me . i wake up ten minute before this movie start on tv and flick the switch and and think and ok cool and a james cagney movie . i wasn not prepare for the roller coaster plunge through abyssal night . or the violent way with which the rider carom off into the void . the end scene be totally classic with dialogue and revelation that pitch the film into the dark reach of noir . everything about this movie be hype and cotter ( cagney ) hasn not get a bottle of champagne and he get a jeroboam and he hasn not get a revolver and he get an automatic and he hasn not get one honey and he get two and we do not do 100 kilometer per hour and we do 100 mile per hour and and in a car the size of a carnival float . the guy a total psycho and but not in the robert ryan way that turn you against his character and in the cagney way where it all like some big game to him . there be a lot of totally mesmerise scene in this movie . two stand out just for the sheer exhilaration factor this be the bit where you coo out loud . when barbara ( holiday carleton ) throw a pot of coffee at cotter he say and no cream . and so she throw the cream at him and no sugar . so he get the sugar and and finally no cigar . i be on the floor . then there be the scene where helena ( margaret dobson ) take him out for a drive in her sporty little number . she take it up to a hundred to scare him and and then he stamp his foot on hers and take it to 110 whilst she frantically swerve . some people have comment on how the framing device of the court case doesn not work . but for me it total brutality and the director doesn not waste time with the minutia of court proceeding and he just use them to make plain right from the very start that it all gon na end badly . it a complete train wreck of a movie and there isn not an honest man in sight and and the casual nature of the violence just shock you . cut kill people like he take out the trash and it just another chore . there also classic support from ward bond and in this movie he always look like he gon na screw you up and toss you away . this role stand apart from the usual supporting role he get and either buffoonish ( fort apache ) and ineffectual ( johnny guitar ) and foolishly vigilante ( on dangerous ground ) . ok so we get broad with pzazz and we get dialogue to die for and we get utter magnetism from the lead actor ( a only cagney can be ) and and we have get total and anthracitic and ebonic and pitch black noir . 1 negative .