Les Cadets de West Point

When previewing a performance for the musical show being put on, Cagney says "Wouldn't hiss, wouldn't cheer." That about sums it up perfectly, except that I am hissing - some. This movie musical about Cagney helping West Point cadets put on a musical revue, simply just lays there. Despite his energetic presence and the talents of Doris Day, Gordon MacRae, Gene Nelson, and Virginia Mayo, it comes across as lifeless. The musical numbers are upbeat and Cagney uses his whole body to show disgust for incompetent amateurs (if you've seen it, you know what I mean,) but the songs are not original or grand enough to really stand out. It may seem pleasant enough at the time, but after nearly two hours, you feel worn out. See another Doris Day or James Cagney film first.

Cagney plays Elwin "Bix" Bixby, a formerly successful showman with a very bad temper, reduced to staging the numbers at a hole-in-the-wall Manhattan nightclub, assisted by his long-suffering fiancée, Eve (Virginia Mayo). Bix is more or less blackmailed into accepting a job directing the 100th Night show at West Point by a Broadway producer. The catch? The producer wants Bix to persuade his nephew, Tom (Gordon MacRae), the star and co-writer of the show with his friend Hal (Gene Nelson), to give up the Army for a singing career. So Bix (who hates West Point, based on past Army experiences) ends up at the Academy along with Eve, directing the show but temperamentally at odds with the lifestyle.

Somehow the solution to this is to make him a cadet (don't even ask, it makes no sense). And in the course of events, he persuades a movie star acquaintance, Jan Wilson (Doris Day), who is on a press junket in New York City, to travel up the Hudson to attend a formal dance at the Point as Tom's "drag." I forget why, but who cares? The plot just gets more incomprehensible as the show goes on, but the fact is, this movie is still a lot of fun. I disagree with some of the people here because I think the original songs by Jule Styne and Sammy Cahn are terrific. None were hits, but there are just a lot of really good songs here. And the arrangements are in the best Ray Heindorf style. Cagney is fantastic, more dynamic and committed than 10 other actors. The singing, by Day and MacRae, is top-notch, and Doris in particular elevates every scene she's in, she's like a human antidepressant. Gene Nelson, an excellent dancer, has a few good numbers, and Virginia Mayo is sincere and funny as Cagney's girl and a very good dancer as well.

If you choose to focus on the positives and if you can manage to ignore some of the plot holes, you should have a good time with this one.

James Cagney really gives his all (and that's plenty of talent) to the role of a rambunctious song-and-dance man who takes over a show at West Point, with the help of a talented cast including Virginia Mayo, Doris Day, Gordon MacRae and Gene Nelson. Cagney struts around getting angry and defiant as only he can, bringing lots of much needed life to a tiresome script. It's one of his best as a song-and-dance man, making one wish he had done even more musical films.

But this one could have used Technicolor and a wittier script with better songs. All of the talent cannot overcome the story's limitations and the overuse of rear projection photography for many of the outdoor scenes. Alan Hale, Jr. gets some good chuckles out of his "Princess" role and there's a light-heartiness about the whole film that keeps it entertaining enough for the most part.

Doris Day is missing from the first third of the movie, but once she shows up she demonstrates why she became such a cheerful Warner Bros. star. She and Gordon MacRae do nicely by a couple of forgettable songs.

Summing up: Worth seeing for Cagney alone. He's in fine shape for some energetic dance routines.

Silly story line about a show staged by an outsider at the Point,but any movie that has singing by Gordon Macrae and Doris Day plus dancing by Virginia Mayo And Gene Nelson is a must see.If only to show today's movie fans the quality of talent that was around during the 1950s' Forget the story,and enjoy the musical numbers.

He spits out lame dialog like it was Shakespeare, he talk-sings with a verve that could give Rex Harrison or Robert Preston lessons, he stomps up and down, he uppercuts, he dances up a storm. There's plenty of A-list talent in this uninspired Warners musical, but a 51-year-old Cagney is pretty much the whole show, and he appears to believe in the hole-filled plot so much that you buy it, too, despite the many lapses of logic. I find his teaming with Virginia Mayo a little distasteful--he's plainly too old for her--but she lends a lot of enthusiasm, too, as does Doris Day, given some middling Jule Styne-Sammy Cahn ballads to warble (and some very unattractive gowns to model), and Gene Nelson, tapping exuberantly, and Gordon MacRae, with his fine natural baritone. Cagney felt he did his best dancing in this film, and it's worth sitting through the dated, hit-you-on-the-head patriotism and weird plot mechanics to get to his virtuosic numbers--he even taps a bit with Day, who started out as a dancer and keeps up brilliantly with him. It's not a good movie, exactly, but I'd trade a lot of neater, better-crafted musicals for this one's dumb liveliness, and for Cagney's genius. I mentioned Robert Preston above; Cagney was, in fact, considered for Professor Harold Hill before Preston was hired. I think he'd have been terrific.