Come Fill the Cup

Six years after Billy Wilder,Gordon makes his own "lost week-end".Both Cagney and Gig Young are convincing in their parts of barflies desperately trying to find a way out of this hell.

I think that the film noir side weakens the film:all that concerns the "singer" (a gangster's moll) and the gang gets in the way.

On the other hand,Boyd's relationship with his mother is really frightening and it is a pity that the part of this over possessive woman was so underwritten.Almost every line she says is revealing: "Boy's sleeping" "He may get cold,I'm going to cover him up well".Too bad Phyllis Thaxter and her mother-in-law have virtually no scene together either.

A good film anyway.

This is a far too seldom televised Cagney picture, made in his more mature years. Cagney is top-notch as an alcoholic reporter finally scared enough by the threat of death ("Angel feathers," his reformed alcoholic savior James Gleason tells him) to go on the wagon. He's enlisted by his publisher boss Raymond Massey to mentor--basically slap some sense into-- Massey's incipient alcoholic nephew, Gig Young. The plot is rather work-a-day, and Cagney is all too dynamic for a recovering alcoholic; he never convinces us that being dry is agony. Moreover, it shows none of the stark horror of alcoholism better dramatized in The Lost Weekend or Days of Wine and Roses. Yet the script is taut and it's always a treat to watch Cagney at work. And James Gleason, one of the most personable of character actors, was never better. Watch his expectant face as he tries his daily attempt at a pseudo Bloody Mary on his roommate, Cagney. "Still tomato juice," they say in unison.

Come Fill The Cup is Warner Brothers answer to Paramount and The Lost Weekend. Come to think of it, the film could literally be where the Paramount classic left off.

Imagine James Cagney as the Ray Milland character as The Lost Weekend concluded. Remember both of them are writers, Cagney however was a newspaper reporter. He loses his job due to his alcoholism, but gets the same kind of wakeup call Milland got and goes back to working for the paper that hired him in the first place.

Flash forward about five years and Cagney is now city editor and the big boss, publisher Raymond Massey calls him in. Cagney has hired several former drinkers who are making a success on the paper and he thinks that Cagney is just the man to help straighten out his nephew Gig Young who is going down the same path. Young is a promising composer who has let his talent go to waste in a sea of booze.

Two things complicate the picture for Cagney. First Young is married, but separated from Phyllis Thaxter who used to be Cagney's girl. But also Young is now getting himself involved with Charlita, a little chanteuse from south of the border who gangster Sheldon Leonard has put his brand on. And to top that all off Leonard is the target of Massey's newspaper. It gets positively incestuous in Come Fill The Cup.

Gig Young got an Academy Award nomination for his role and his scenes of inebriation and withdrawal are every bit as good as the ones that got Ray Milland his Oscar for The Lost Weekend. Young lost in the Oscar sweepstakes to Karl Malden for A Streetcar Named Desire. The guy who should get some acclaim here is James Gleason who plays Cagney's roommate and sponsor in helping to kick the booze habit. Gleason's death scene and Cagney's reaction to it are the dramatic high points of the movie.

As for Cagney a lot of his usual mannerisms that sometimes carry along a bad film and make it better are missing. But he doesn't need them in playing this part.

I had not seen this film in several decades and quite frankly had forgotten how good it is. Demand that TCM show this one and demand that Warner Brothers get this out on DVD.

I consider it to be one of Cagney's best. A very entertaining film, not merely a morality play, complete with a good plot, witty dialog, and humor. In one scene, the local crime boss (Sheldon Leonard) "forces" two alcoholics to drink whiskey at gunpoint. In an ironic twist, one of the drunks deciding whether or not to quit the bottle in the film is Gig Young, a real-life alcoholic who later killed his wife and himself. The difference between this film and most others is its' contention that the alcoholic must want to quit, and that this desire must come from one's self. I nearly said "anti-booze" film, but that is not true. In it, most of the characters are able to drink without becoming alcoholics, just like in real life. Alcohol aside, this is a classic crusading newspaperman versus gangster story of the 40s and 50s with music and humorous twists for spice. This is definitely one of my favorite films.

I saw this film for the first - and, up to now, last - time just after its release in early 1952 (original English version). "Come fill the cup" is one of those films that seem to have unjustly disappeared. It has never been released in this country, Spain, nor seen in television either here, in Belgium - where I lived 1973-1993 - or several other European countries linked to Brussels TV, U.K. not excluded. After all these years, I remember that all the actors are terrific, Cagney outstanding. Young - not surprisingly - was convincing, and the music score - an unfinished piano concert - haunting. From other comments, I assume that a DVD of this noir classic would be most welcome by Cagney fans of all ages.