TCM's Film Noir of the Week Saturday Night-Sunday Morning at 12 a.m. ET (and 10 a.m. ET Sunday Morning) is Raoul Walsh's White Heat (1949), Starring Jimmy Cagney, with Virginia Mayo, Edmond O'Brien, Steve Cochran and Margaret Wycherly

By David in TN
May 3, 2019 at 12:41:00 A.M. EDT

TCM's Film Noir of the Week Saturday Night-Sunday Morning at 12 a.m. ET (and 10 a.m. ET Sunday Morning) is White Heat (1949). Directed by Raoul Walsh, with James Cagney, Virginia Mayo, Edmond O'Brien, Steve Cochran, and Margaret Wycherly.

Film Noir Guide: "Cagney shines in his role as a psychopathic, mother-fixated killer, who fears he may follow in his old-man's footsteps and die 'kicking and screaming in the nut-house.' In the meantime, he suffers from excruciating and debilitating headaches that can be relieved only by attention from his loving Ma (Wycherly). O'Brien, Cagney's cellmate and surrogate mother, is an undercover cop who plans their escape so he can trace the dough from Cagney's last big heist--a daring, daytime train robbery. Mayo, usually portrayed as the all-American girl next door, is sensational as Cagney's femme fatale wife. Cochran plays the gangster's rival, who is having an affair with Mayo. Cagney, who became a star with Public Enemy in 1931, marked his return to the genre with an explosive performance. This is an intense and explicitly violent film noir, with a climax that gives the ending of The Godfather a run for its money as the most memorable in the history of American crime movies."

At the end, Cagney shouts one of the most famous lines ever.