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Angel on My Shoulder (1946) More at IMDbPro »

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23 out of 25 people found the following comment useful :-
A good period fantasy, 28 September 2004
Author: (strausbaugh) from Brooklyn

I admit I'm a sucker for both postwar noir and movies about heaven, hell, the Devil et al, from "Dante's Inferno" through "Petey Wheatstraw," so maybe I like this one more than you would. But I do like it a lot. Paul Muni is hilarious, mugging outrageously when he's not leaping through the air to rumble with devils or thugs.

Never been the biggest Claude Rains fan--his prissiness wears on me midway through any film he's in--but he makes a good, nasty Satan. The scenes in Hell, which looks like the boiler room on the Titanic, are priceless. Lots of good character actors playing brawny devils, lunkheaded mooks, tough dames, flustered Man Fridays and such. The plots a little more clever than you'd expect from this kind of film, with a very nice twist at the end. Definitely worth seeing if you're a fan of the oldies.

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17 out of 17 people found the following comment useful :-
Excellent performances all around in MR. JORDAN turned around, 28 December 2003
Author: Ray Faiola from New York, NY

To begin, it's tough as nails to see a decent print of this public domain film. TCM has a very good 35mm print in their library, so I recommend seeing it there (unless you're fortunate to see it on the screen).

ANGEL ON MY SHOULDER was written by Harry Segall, who also penned HERE COMES MR. JORDAN. The film is a delicious turnabout of its wonderful predecessor and Claude Rains turns in his angels wings for devils hoofs and, frankly, is much more deliciously at home. Anne Baxter is superbly understated as Barbara Foster and Onslow Stevens has a larger-than-usual role as her friend and Judge Parker's doctor/psychiatrist. Judge Parker and Eddie Kagle are both played by the great Paul Muni. Muni is a joy to watch in this picture. He rises to both comedic and extraordinarily sensitive moments in the film. And he does a few "Scarface" pantomime moments, brief elegant gestures, that show what a truly great screen presence he could be.

The crucial scene in ANGEL ON MY SHOULDER is where Eddie, brought back from Hades by the Devil and now inhabiting the body of Judge Parker, is having a picnic lunch with his secretary/fiancé. Here he discovers all the truly important and wonderful things that life has to offer - all of which he lost out on because of his life of crime and immorality. Eddie is torn and tortured and Muni plays the inner torment with amazing sincerity. Helping a great deal is one of Dimitri Tiomkin's best, though least-known, musical scores. It is a far cry from his usual bombast and has many passages of great tenderness.

Rains, of course, is marvelous and there are quite a few genuinely threatening moments in his performance. Fine support is given by James Flavin (who, in addition to his role as politico Bellamy is also heard off-screen as a district attorney, a very curious happenstance), George Cleveland (as the Judge's valet), Erskine Sanford as a minister, Hardie Albright as Smiley Williams and Fritz Leiber, Noble Johnson and Kurt Katch as residents of Hades.

This is not a great film. But it's a very, very good film with some very fine sequences and performances. It deserves far better treatment than it has received since its copyright lapsed.

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18 out of 20 people found the following comment useful :-
An All-Time Classic, 2 December 2001
Author: Tiny-13 from 5

It's the film everyone remembers from those Saturday afternoon TV film matinees. The producer, Charles R. Rogers, had a pretty bleak record when it came to producing films on his own (he was once a V.P. at Universal before going solo). But with "Angel" he knocked it out of the park. He inserted age-old movie favorties and combined them into one story. Gangsters, fights, comedy, drama, fantasy... what's not to love?

"Angel on My Shoulder" (1946) offers up classic performances by such legendary stars as Paul Muni, Anne Baxter, and Claude Rains. All cast to type, they give performances that are timeless. When you think of any of these stars, think of them in this film and it will give you a pretty good idea as to what each was known for.

Although this film was put together during the tail end of World War II and was designed as escapist fun, it holds up today. In fact, it begs for a good re-make. One was done for TV back in 1980, but fell flat. So bad was that version, that they should pay you to watch it. Yet if someone was to do it correctly today, they would have a real gem on their hands.

If you haven't seen the original 1946 version, catch it on TV. It belongs in everybody's movie-watching repertoire.

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11 out of 12 people found the following comment useful :-
Tony Carmonte meets a diabolical Mr. Jordan, 25 September 2006
10/10
Author: theowinthrop from United States

This film is a nice mixture of two great movies: the crime film SCARFACE (1932) and the fantasy HERE COMES MR. JORDAN. And it also is the only time that two of the best actors of the golden age of sound films worked in a film side by side in the same scenes of a movie.* I am referring to Mr. Paul Muni, who played Tony Carmonte in SCARFACE and Mr. Claude Rains, who played that beacon of heavenly fairness and decency Mr. Jordan in HERE COMES MR. JORDAN.

(*The two actors actually appeared in a film before this: JUAREZ in 1939. But Paul Muni played Benito Juarez, and shared no scene with Rains as Napoleon III of France - the two leaders never met.)

Muni's Eddie Kagle is a reprise of his Tony Carmonte, complete with Carmonte's deadly looking slit-like stare. But at the start of the film he is murdered by "Smiley" Williams (Hardie Albright - who is always smiling), and finds himself in the netherworld's lower regions. In some ways Eddie's discovery of Hell is among the best part of the film, as he sees the other inhabitants are all in a state of continuous agony and realization of their own sins. Eddie does not have sufficient time to suffer to become as zombie-like. A stranger comes to him, offering him an opportunity to get out of that place. Eddie is willing to hear the deal.

The stranger is Rains, naturally playing the Devil (and thus joining the ranks of Walter Huston, Adolphe Menjou, Ray Milland, Laird Cregar, Ray Walston, and Edward Arnold). Rains is a businesslike Devil, who complains to his henchman that the place is too cold (the henchman increases the heat). He has nothing currently going on, when he has noticed Muni. Muni's Eddie Kagle resembles a Judge Parker, an honest, upright man who is running for governor of his state. Rains realizes that if Kagle can replace Parker, then he can ruin the Judge's campaign for cleaning up the corruption in his state.

So Rains makes his offer to the eager Muni: if Kagle agrees to this switch, playing the role of Parker while the latter is in an enforced coma, and undoing Parker's campaign, Kagle will get a chance to even the score with good old "Smiler". Muni is definitely interested, but he wants a guarantee of no double-crossing. He knows his Devil as well as any other human, and he does not want old "Smiler" to get away.

This is the main problem that perplexes Rains in the movie. He is the author of all the mischief in the universe, but he is also unable to fully control how that mischief is working (an interesting variation on the Devil - compare Rains here with Milland as "Nick Beal" or Walter Huston (for the most part) as "Mr. Scratch"). The best moment illustrating this problem: Rains gets Muni worked up to deliver a violent tirade that would send Judge Parker's campaign into the toilet. But a bunch of gangsters, opposed to Parker, arrange for the "Judge" to be met with a barrage of garbage thrown at him on stage when he's about to speak, knocking him out. Rains is flabbergasted by this, and he can't prevent it: the gangsters are doing his work too. Kagel/Parker is not condemned in the papers but praised for his bravery against the gangsters.

Also, as the film progresses, Muni meets the Judge's girlfriend Barbara Foster (Anne Baxter). He falls for her, and she slowly "corrupts" him - he starts wondering if the Judge and Barbara don't have the better view of the world.

The film is a good fantasy, that resolves well - a kind of a twist, in fact, on the conclusion of CASABLANCA, with Muni and Rains walking off together, tied by the knot of their agreement. But who will win - we are never certain until the end.

The title of the film, by the way, is based on a line of dialog from a sermon that a minister (Erskine Sanford) is preparing and reads out loud.

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9 out of 10 people found the following comment useful :-
entertaining fantasy, 16 September 2006
8/10
Author: blanche-2 from United States

Paul Muni is a dead convict brought back to earth by the devil in "Angel on my Shoulder," a 1946 film also starring Claude Rains and Anne Baxter. Muni is Eddie, a convict fresh out of jail who is killed by his partner Smiley and goes straight to you know where. Let's just say it's hot. The devil, played by Claude Rains, needs help himself. A Judge Parker is keeping too many candidates out of hell, and he sees that Eddie is a ringer for the Judge. So he arranges for Eddie to get into the judge's body as he sleeps so that he can ruin the judge's reputation and Eddie can get revenge on Smiley. But even the best-laid plans of the Devil can go astray.

During and after World War II, films dealt with psychiatry, with angels, with death, and with people returning from the dead. All of this had to do with the emotional and adjustment problems that returning soldiers had and with the loss of loved ones in countless families. "Angel on My Shoulder" is along the same idea as "Here Comes Mr. Jordan" and "A Guy Named Joe," and a close brother of "Heaven Can Wait" and the later "The Bishop's Wife." This is an excellent example of the genre, with top acting by Paul Muni, Anne Baxter, and Claude Rains. Muni is great in a Bogart type of role - he gives a performance imbued with toughness and humor as a bad guy who begins to see the other side of evil. Anne Baxter is very good as his patient but suffering fiancée, endeavoring to understand the difference in the judge's personality. As the Devil, Claude Rains is inspired casting. He's elegant, charming and manipulative, and gets plenty nervous when he sees things aren't working out as he planned.

Wonderful film, and a good chance to see the fine actor Paul Muni in a lighter role than he usually played.

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8 out of 9 people found the following comment useful :-
Worth seeing for Paul Muni, 22 January 2005
Author: thepoetbandit from Humboldt County, Calif.

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

I didn't know anything about Muni, but I was hooked into this film by his performance. At nearly 50 when he made this movie, he quite effectively conveyed a boyish marvel when he crossed over from the dark side (trying not to include any spoilers). I believe his performance is what makes this film work. He brought comedy and dry wit into the scenes, without, himself, being too corny. He also brought energy and resilience. Watching the movie, I felt I was watching a 21st century actor. His performance is quite different than the somber, pensive performances of characters his age in noir films of that day. In summary, while this is not a great film, it is a gem just because it so different, made that way especially by Muni's performance.

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11 out of 15 people found the following comment useful :-
Dark Comedy, 18 February 2001
Author: Matthew Ignoffo (mermatt@webtv.net) from Eatontown, NJ, USA

In HERE COMES MR. JORDAN, Claude Rains played an angel. Here he gets to play the opposite end of the game -- the role every actor loves to play, Satan. He is wry, menacing, and delicious as the master of evil who has met his match in a hood played wonderfully by Paul Muni. The story is interesting and the acting is first rate. See this one if you get the chance.

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10 out of 14 people found the following comment useful :-
Needs A Little More Credibility, Even For A Fantasy, 27 November 2006
5/10
Author: ccthemovieman-1 from Lockport, NY, United States

The first 25 minutes of this movie were very interesting and entertaining with a good mixture of action and comedy. however, once Claude Raines (The Devil) and Paul Muni (a hood who had been killed and sent to Hell) returned to earth and the latter became romantically involved, the film bogged down.

Muni assumes the body of "Judge Parker" but still talks and thinks like the thug he was as his old self. I know it's a fantasy story and not be taken seriously, but still - Parker's fiancé never figuring out that this was not the judge even though his grammar, speech, actions, everything about him except his looks was totally foreign to what he used to be - it was too ridiculous and insulting to anyone's intelligence. Fantasy or not, you have to have at least some credibility in the story! I stayed with the film the whole way, and it wasn't bad but I wouldn't watch it again.

For those who don't believe there is a Devil, this is a good movie to see as it effectively shows how he whispers attractive things in one's ear and how persuasive he can be....all the while ruining you.

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4 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
Clever, Amusing, and a little Surprising, 5 November 2007
7/10
Author: mstomaso from Vulcan

Paul Muni leads a talented cast in Archie Mayo's dark comedy about a wise-guy (Eddie Kagle/Muni) who, murdered, finds himself entangled in one of Satan's (Claude Rains) schemes to outwit his arch-rival and steal the soul of a righteous judge who happens to look exactly like Kagle. Kagle is willing to do the devil's handiwork as long as he can get revenge upon his murderer. But living vicariously in the life of a good man (Judge Parker), loved by an even better woman (Barbara/Anne Baxter) Kagle begins to question the evils of his life.

While Angel on my Shoulder is not quite a redemption story, it endows its characters with just enough conscience to make them sympathetic. The characterizations are strong - especially for the three leads - Muni, Rains and Baxter. All three are excellent, and help to make the film worth watching. The script is good, and occasionally very clever, but also slips once in a while. The pace is steady though not brisk. The cinematography is, at times, a bit hokey, but this fits the occasional lapses into silliness which the story indulges.

Recommended for young adults and older adults. Aspects of the film may frighten younger viewers and some of the key humor may not be appropriate for kids.

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4 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
Bemused and funny film with comedy and romance, 26 October 2005
7/10
Author: ma-cortes

Picture concerns about a gangster called Eddie Kagle(Paul Muni) who is based his way of living on what Omar Khayyan once said : ¨Live fully while you may and reckon not the cost¨. He leaves the State Penitentiary imprisoned accused of murderous and makes a covenant with the devil(Claude Rains) and returns to earth for vengeance as an important judge .He become incarnate in the kind judge and the problems emerge when is romanced with his girlfriend(Anne Baxter) falling in love with her,but the good heart mobster spoil the relationship.

It's a romantic movie with a supernatural love story.Enjoyable romance tale where trio protagonist are sensational.Bemusing fantasy with excellent interpretation Paul Muni(Scarface) in comic character while he usually played historic or dramatic roles.Claude Rains(Casablanca) as ironic and obstinate Devil is magnificent although in ¨Here comes Mr. Jordan¨ he played an Angel. Anne Baxter is enticing and attractive. Fine production design in the Inferno's recreation. The motion picture is well directed by Archie Mayo (Bordertown,Petrified forest,Black legion) in his last film, he's a specialist on noir cinema who worked with almost all Warner Brothers biggest stars(Paul Muni,James Cagney,Raft,Bogart) though directed also some comedy as this film and with Marx Brothers,¨one night in Casablanca¨ which had more pace and spirit that some of their later work. Rating : Entertained and well worth watching.

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