The Bowery

High energy Raoul Walsh classic from 1933, The Bowery places saloon owner and operator Wallace Beery against bitter rival and dandy, George Raft, with adopted street kid Jackie Cooper and good looking Faye Wray in roles that play in between their big rivalry. It's not clear exactly what the rivalry is all about, but everyone follows it in the daily tabloids. Plenty of wisecracks at the beginning, but the characters soften up as the film progresses. Apart from that is the sheer exuberance of the scenes in Beery's saloon. The various characters, sexy chorus line, lots of drinking, a perfect creation of a den of iniquity not too refrained by so-called pre-code restrictions, and then later come the Carrie Nations led by Carrie Nation herself. It all creates a very vivid picture of a life that's long gone. I don't like to compare eras, but this film is completely and totally different from anything one would see today. The film has plenty of heart and long lost innocence and is absolutlely a must see.

Such are the title-song lyrics to this 1933 frolic, directed by Raoul Walsh to be modest in story but long on atmosphere. Made at 20th, it has something of an MGM cast: Wallace Beery and Jackie Cooper had been such a hit in "The Champ" two years earlier, the studio must have been anxious to reteam them. Cooper was a good little actor, but here, as.an unsympathetic little ruffian in the Lower East Side of the Gay '90s, he's just marking time, and Beery, whom practically everybody who ever worked with him appears to have loathed, tries and fails to be a charmer. The story's that of Steve Brodie and his alleged jump off the Brooklyn Bridge (it was also the basis for "Kelly," a one-night 1965 musical that was, up till then, the biggest money-loser in Broadway history); it's not much of a story, but it does allow for some lively set pieces, and George Raft, as Brodie, has a part that suits him well. There's also Fay Wray, who's warm and appealing, and Pert Kelton, expertly knocking out one of the sassy broads she did so well back then. Marred by phony-looking process shots and plot implausibilities and non-clear things (I'm still not sure, did they throw a dummy off the bridge or not?), and off-the-charts non-PC by today's standards, it's nevertheless rollicking, and you can be sure that under Walsh's watch you'll get hard-hitting fights, atmosphere galore, rude insult humor, and a setting where, like the song goes, they do strange things.

A favourite of mine,this movie tells of two feuding New York "characters", Steve Brodie(Raft) and "Chuck" Connors(Beery),who both strive to be the "Main Guy" in the Bowery in the late Nineteenth Century.

Brodie(1863-1901) and Connors(1852-1913),were real people,though this is a heavily fictionalized account of their antics(based on a play).Brodie's legendary(did he do it?- it's still a cause of argument!),jump from the Brooklyn bridge(1886),for which he became famous,is shown here as happening around the same time as the Spanish-American war(1898).Director Walsh clearly had a great affection for the period,so beautifully recreated here,and it includes a wild rumbustious ragtime number from saloon singer Trixie Odbray(a young Pert Kelton).Raft is at his slickest as Brodie,and Beery shows again what a clever actor he was,as tough, big hearted, and at times quite touching Connors.Pretty Fay Wray is the love interest both the boys are pursuing.

Full of life and energy,"The Bowery" moves at a fast pace(unlike many early "talkies").It is not an easy movie to find,but is well worth looking out for.

I love this freekin movie! Walsh is a true master of the cinematic form, his film have been sometimes in my opinion, overlooked. But this film is a favourite of mine because it really gives you the feel of the time the film was set in.\

All the wonderful characters that existed, the lifestyle, the mode of dress, the way they spoke, OK they might be exaggerated, but it is good to know that there were occasion when two men tried to outdo each other with insane stunts.

I just felt it was apiece of history thats should be wathced by many people and appreciated because of that fact.

Can I get it somewhere on DVD? I have only seen it on TV. But for anyone wanting a slice of life movie about that period of time this is the perfect one.

In Brooklyn a century ago, the rivalry between Chuck Connors and Steve Brodie and their competing volunteer fire brigades leads to Brodie's famous bet that he can jump off the Brooklyn Bridge. This is a story which will be familiar to a lot of people through a Bugs Bunny spoof, "Bowery Bugs" from 1949.

This generally very enjoyable film would probably be more widely available if it were not for the notorious and unsettling scene involving some Chinese tenement dwellers -- a time capsule of antediluvian racial attitudes, giving the film a great deal of historical interest, in my view.