Robert J. Maxwell James Cagney, tired of the Warner brothers' niggardliness, left the studio and established his own production company with his brother Bill. He shouldn't have.The productions ranged from the ambitious ("The Time of Your Life") to the potboilers like this one. Avoid it.Cagney is his usual bouncy and engaging self but the story of a newspaper reporter in Tokyo in the pre-war years fails almost completely. Well, 1945, and we were at war with Japan so some excess should be expected. Yet it needn't be quite as lowbrow as this. "Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo" was far more mature.Here the Japanese are all slimy creatures, polite, treacherous, and in the case of the chief villain -- who is an astounding ten feet tall -- I swear wears a set of false buck teeth. The dialog and acting are nearly unbearable."I want to call my editor." "Is not permitted terephone. Prease reave."I couldn't sit through it without chemically altering my brain beforehand -- and I hadn't.

Tweekums Set in 1920s Japan James Cagney plays newspaperman Nick Condon. He has offended the Japanese authorities by publishing an article suggesting that Japan has plans to attack China and ultimately the United States and when he is given a document, which implicates Premier Tanaka and his underling Colonel Tojo, that seems to prove this his life is in danger; two people have already died while trying to get it out of the country. They send Iris Hilliard, a half Chinese woman to try to trick him into handing over the document… but he no longer has it and has no idea who does have it!Made in 1945 it isn't surprising that the Japanese are depicted in a negative way but they could have been a lot worse; not all of them are portrayed as being bent on world domination. James Cagney does a solid enough job as Condon and Sylvia Sidney was okay as Iris… although she didn't look half Chinese and romance between her and Cagney isn't the most believable on screen. There isn't much action but there fight scene at the end is pretty good; its scrappiness making it more believable than an obviously choreographed fight would be. As the finale approaches the tension rises as at times it looks as if our hero could die for his course. Overall this isn't a classic Cagney film but it is enjoyable enough.

morrison-dylan-fan Despite my dad owning a number of his films on DVD,I have somehow up to now only seen James Cagney in the overlooked 1935 movie G-Men. (which in no way is related to X-Men!)Talking to a friend recently,I discovered that he was interested in seeing Cagney's non-gangster titles,which led to me deciding that it would be a good time to see Cagney cover the sun with blood.The plot:Being credited as the editor who saved the paper from folding,Tokyo Chronicle editor Nick Condon begins to suspect that he may have just grabbed the story of the decade,thanks to an informant giving him a document titled "The Tanaka Memorial",which contain details about Japan's planned invasions for world domination.With having enjoyed a high amount of press freedom whilst working at the paper,Condon begins to suspect that he may have gotten hold of something very important,due to a number of police officers and politician's suddenly becoming extremely aggressive towards the paper.Fearing that he and Chronicle are at increasing risk of being permanently shut down,Condon rushes to publish the story,as he begins to find out how far the police,army and politician's are willing to go to keep the document out of the public's eye.View on the film:Made just as WWII was coming to an end,and also just before questions about the real Tanaka Memorial began to get raised, (with the document now being seen as a fake,designed to get the Alieies on the side of China's Communist party,which it succeeded in doing) the screenplay by Lester Cole,Frank Melford,Garrett Fort and Nathaniel Curtis initially make the movie appear that it is going to take a close look at the blurred lines separating the government and the press.Sadly,despite director Frank Lloyd and art directors A.Roland Fields and Wiard Ihnen, (who would both win an Oscar for their work in the title) covering the movie with tense darken alleyways and low-lit lighting,the screenplay burns out after the first 30 minutes,with the exciting espionage moments in the film being drained of their energy by the writer's jumbling them up,instead of allowing each double cross/close escape to twist naturally.Being filmed as his second feature to be from his own production company,James Cagney gives a rattling performance as Nick Condon,with Cagney showing Condon gradually becoming increasingly distrusting of all those around him as he gets closer to hitting the dead line.Along with Condon using his quick-wit to out smart the dark forces at power,Cagney also displays a surprising skill for excellent stunt work,thanks to the movie featuring a number of great,rough'n' tumble judo battles,all of which are not performed by a stunt person,but are in fact done by Cagney himself (something which Cagney would continue training with,long after the movie had been completed),which leads to this blood stained sun being one that wont fully fade out into a total eclipse.

calvinnme After James Cagney won his Academy Award for Best Actor, he broke free of Warner Bros. and began focusing on what he considered to be art. Cagney's own production company made this wartime thriller, and it is one of his better efforts among his 1940's independent works. Cagney plays an American newspaper reporter living in Japan who crosses wires with the expansionist Japanese government. Cagney's character is fluent in both Japanese and Chinese, and even knows judo. It's refreshing to see a film from the immediate post-war era that doesn't try to simplify the problem of what happened in Japan and Germany with something like - If only these people would start playing baseball, learn to love hot dogs, and be more like Americans, this sort of thing would never have happened.Cagney's character, Nick Condun, has to hide some expansionist Japanese plans from the Japanese government until he can safely get the data to the American embassy. Along the way he finds an ally in half-Chinese Sylvia Sydney's character Iris Hilliard, who becomes Nick's love interest. One thing about the production code you have to understand - interracial love is strictly taboo, so Nick and Iris' love scenes are less than satisfying. At the end of the film they share just the tiniest bit of a kiss.Cagney is always fun to watch whether he's on an unrighteous or righteous tear, so I'd recommend it even if the script could have perhaps been a little more lively to match the energy of the lead actor.