There is only one God and his name is James Cagney

De Niro, Brando, Pesci, Al Pacino, Robinson, Bogart are all titans of the mobster movie genre, but there is only one God and his name is James Cagney. Short and broad with a striking face, during the 1930s no other star symbolised the emotional disturbances of American life as compellingly as Cagney.

Born in New York to a family of Irish descent, the young Cagney harboured two ambitions – to be a boxer and to be a dancer. He took lessons in boxing on the sly and even won runner-up for a lightweight amateur title. One day his mother ended his pugilist dreams when she asked: “think ya could take me?”. Hesitating, he shyly responded “no ma”. “Then” Mrs Cagney decreed “we’ll hear no more of that!”. Thereafter he turned his full attention to dancing and finding a job. After gaining good reviews in Vaudeville, Cagney was picked up by producers in Hollywood. He was indifferent to fame and never vied for the glamour and luxury of his contemporaries, and although he had the cinematic demeanour of an indomitable brute, in real life he was a quiet, polite and thoughtful man who generated nothing but admiration and respect.

In 1931 he was hired to star in The Public Enemy, a masterpiece of early sound cinema. His performance as the prohibition mobster Tom Powers made him an instant icon and it remains a masterclass in movie acting. The film is famed for his slow and rainy walk towards a brief but bloody shoot-out as well as for a scene when he suddenly shoves a grapefruit into the face of his girlfriend over breakfast. Audiences had never seen the portrayal of such a vicious and ill-mannered man before. He advertised all the appeal of being on the wrong side of the law: nice suits, fast cars, beautiful dames. But as in all his roles, Cagney manages to coax a strange kind of affection out of the viewer for his villainous behaviour.

Once he had established himself as the “King of Crime”, he found it hard to break free from the stereotype of a loveable psychopath. And for good reason. He continued to make classics like Angels with Dirty Faces (1938), in which he plays the character of Rocky opposite his long-time collaborators Humphrey Bogart and Pat O’Brien. The usual conundrums of morality and crime pervade the plot, but the execution of the actors is exquisite. I will not spoil the end of this exhilarating and enchanting film but it’s a climax that makes the dramatic conclusion of The Departed (2008) look dull and uninspired.

A year later he starred opposite Bogart in The Roaring Twenties. It documents the return of First World War veterans and their struggle to find work in a society that seems indifferent to their heroic service in Europe. Cagney’s character quickly realises (like in every 30s racketeer film he starred in) that liquor is the way to use his toughness and make mountains of cash. Like in his previous pictures, the ending is tantalisingly tragic and subtly didactic. It ruthlessly divulges the inner disasters that harrowed a generation throughout the depression.

Arguably his greatest role was in White Heat (1949) as Cody Jarrett. He is a darker and less sympathetic version of Tom Powers. Crippled by debilitating migraines and suspicious to the point of mania. He has a love for his mother that rivals Norman Bates and he brilliantly reveals his emotional reliance on her when he starts a riot in prison upon hearing of her death. This is without question Cagney’s most unhinged part. A true thug and scoundrel who you can’t help but watch.

Although Cagney worked in the Golden Age of cinema and accomplished triumph after triumph, he was not one for parties or for late nights. He was a dreamer who enjoyed listening to the rain fall over his farm on Martha’s vineyard, who preferred writing poetry to raging in clubs. He worked hard to provide his fellow actors and actresses with more rights that would enable them to resist the tyranny of the studios. He was a relentless advocate of racial equality and even paid for the legal defence of nine black teenagers who were falsely accused of rape. His performances were contradictions of his true nature.

His appearances epitomised the aspiring spirit of the prohibition era and the tragic failure of the American dream. He became the face of the formidable fortune-hunting crook, of the gun-gripping youth, of the self-made millionaire without an inkling of empathy or interest in anyone but himself. Having been a streetfighter as a kid, he didn’t need to act to seem tough. Perhaps that’s why it all seems so easy. Whenever he struck an enemy his own size on screen, it looked like it was no trouble, so he always insisted on having taller adversaries to take down.

The effervescence of his peculiar face, his energetic and zippy gestures, his quick come-backs and authoritative presence quickly became ubiquitous attributes across the crime movie canon. I still can’t imagine a single character from any succeeding crook-based flick who could stand up to Cagney without batting an eye. Orson Welles called him “the greatest actor who ever appeared in front of a camera”. It’s an assertion I find very hard to deny.