LITTLE CAESAR.
Edward G Robinson & Douglas Fairbanks Jr,
Glenda Farrel, Ralph Ince, Stanley Fields.
Dir: Mervyn LeRoy, 1931, Warner Bros.

SYNOPSIS:
Along with the Public Enemy, this kicked the whole gangster genre into the face of the public. The rise and fall of a chubby, vicious hood looks pale and scratchy in the 21st Century but this only adds to its timeless feel. Whereas Cagney's gangster was just a criminal, a kid gone bad, Rico was a snarling, ruthless fucking psychopath and we loved him for it. Yeah. See!

"Eddie was a wonderful man. Later in his career he did things in one or two takes, but not with me on Little Caesar. He would do anything for you if it turned out right, if he trusted you. I never had any trouble with him. I gave them trouble. Eddy was always fooling around. He was a great comic and a great actor. He knew what he was doing. He knew comedy and he knew drama. He was a genius in everything he did."
- Mervyn LeRoy, director.

"The scenes which the mild mannered and pacifist Robinson found the most difficult were the ones involving guns. He was unable to shoot his prop gun without blinking, so the problem was eventually solved by taping his eyelids open for key scene in which he had to shoot and kill the crime commissioner. The art of screen silence had not yet been refined, with no explosive charges that could be taped to the actor's body. When they were to shoot Rico's death scene, steel plates were pinned inside Robinson's clothing. Machine gun bullets (blanks of course, but still dangerous) were to be shot into the plates. Robinson, very gun shy, kept moving off target and almost met his end along with Rico."
- Alan Gansberg, E G Robinson biographer.

REVIEWS:
"Its central character clearly modelled on Al Capone, this also has historical interest as vanguard of a spate of noisy gangster films. The star was forever identified with his role, and the film, though technically dated, moves fast enough to maintain interest over sixty years later."
- Leslie Halliwell.
"One of the best gangster talkers yet turned out. A swell picture."
- Variety.
"It has irony and grim humour and a real sense of excitement and its significance does not get in the way of the melodrama."
- Richard Dana Skinner.