Torrid Zone (1940)

Director:

William Keighley

Writers:

Richard Macaulay (screenplay) and
Jerry Wald (screenplay)

Release Date:

25 May 1940 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Adventure | Comedy

Plot:

Plagued by revolutionaries that harass his plantation in a banana republic, fruit company exec Steve Case rehires former nemesis Nick Butler to restore order and profits.

Plot Keywords:

Screwball Comedy | Mosquito Netting | Chantreuse | Fruit Company | Cheap Hotel

Cast

James Cagney	...	Nick 'Nicky' Butler
Ann Sheridan	...	Lee Donley
Pat O'Brien	...	Mr. Steve Case
Andy Devine	...	Wally Davis
Helen Vinson	...	Mrs. Gloria Anderson
Jerome Cowan	...	Bob 'Bill' Anderson
George Tobias	...	Rosario 'Rosie' La Mata
George Reeves	...	Sancho, Rosario's Henchman
Victor Kilian	...	Carlos (Rosario's henchman)
Frank Puglia	...	Police Chief Juan Rodriguez
John Ridgely	...	Gardner
Grady Sutton	...	Sam, Steve's Secretary
Paul Porcasi	...	Garcia, Hotel Bar Proprietor
Frank Yaconelli	...	Lopez, Plantation Driver (as Frank Yaconnelli)
Dick Botiller	...	Hernandez, Plantation Worker (as Dick Boteler)

Runtime:

88 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | Spanish

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Certification:

Finland:K-16 | Sweden:15 | USA:Approved (PCA #6091)

Company:

Warner Bros. Pictures

Trivia:

George Reeves, Victor Varconi, Joseph Calleia, Alan Hale and George Tobias all tested for the role of Rosario, with the part going to Tobias.

Quotes:

Gloria Anderson: But, Nick, aren't you going to Chicago?
Nick Butler: Sure.
Gloria Anderson: [realizing he is going with Lee, not her] Oh, I get it!
[looking at Lee]
Gloria Anderson: You finally stepped down to your own level!
Lee Donley: That's still about three floors above yours!

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Breakdowns of 1941 (1941)

Soundtrack:

I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles

Oomph in the Tropics

This was the final film for James Cagney and Pat O'Brien who in my opinion invented the buddy film. O'Brien would be leaving Warner Brothers the following year and the two of them would not get together in another film until Ragtime in 1981 in which they both had small parts.

It's a typical fast paced comedy for both of them, they were incapable of doing anything else together. O'Brien slowed down when he was in a clerical collar and Cagney when he was doing a nostalgic film, but together the lines go at light speed.

Except when Ann Sheridan is concerned. Director Bill Keighley always slowed the pace for Sheridan because he didn't want anyone to miss some of her tart sayings. She has some of the best lines ever in her career. Typical being when she tells O'Brien that the stork that brought him must have been a vulture. Or when she's constantly one upping Helen Vinson who made a career of playing the other woman.

O'Brien is the hardnosed manager of a tropical fruit company and he's in big trouble because a local Sandinista type bandit leader, George Tobias, is wrecking his operations. Another distraction is Ann Sheridan whose redheaded beauty he figures is too much of a distraction to the men where redheads are scarce. Notice how O'Brien tells the local authorities what to do. More truth than humor in that situation.

He's desperate enough to hire back his number one troubleshooter James Cagney who gets the job done, but always gets himself in a jackpot where women are concerned. He's taken a fancy to Sheridan and she him.

A couple of other reviewers have pointed out the obvious similarities between this and The Front Page. The first film version of that classic play is the one where Pat O'Brien made his screen debut as the ace reporter. However he did it on Broadway in the role of the editor which he's playing here.

Perhaps this might be better described as another version of His Girl Friday. I can't say remake because both films came out at the same time. Sheridan comes off the same way as Rosalind Russell does in His Girl Friday, but Keighley also wants to accent her sensuality as well as her sharp tongue. He succeeds admirably because no woman in their previous films quite put off both Cagney and O'Brien the way Sheridan does.

The woman sure had oomph.