Blonde Crazy

“Oh, that dirty, double-crossin' rat. I'd like to get my own hooks on him. I'd tear him to pieces.”

“When a cheeky bellhop (a young James Cagney, the same year as he made his blistering appearance in The Public Enemy) meets a dishy blonde (the effervescent Joan Blondell) and gets her installed in his hotel as a chambermaid through nefarious means, the pair set a
criminal scheme into motion. Here’s the grift: they entrap and blackmail married men who are caught up to no good. The problem is that they’re wide open to being conned by a bigger fish, and Louis Calhern is precisely that fish.

Released under the title ‘Larceny Lane’ in Great Britain, Cagney and Blondell’s fiery and frank chemistry is only made sexier by the uncertainty of their loyalty to each other, bothcriminally and romantically. Although initially there appears to be a more respectable suitor in the mix (no less than Ray Milland), he, too, shows a penchant for the felonious. In spite of a rather unexpectedly sweet conclusion, it’s pretty obvious no one who made this movie was interested in ‘respectability’....whatever that word’s supposed to mean. “ Christina Newland

There will be a video intro ahead of both screenings by film critic and journalist Christina Newland, co-curator of Pre-code Hollywood: Rules are Made to be Broken.