The Bowery (film)

The Bowery is a 1933 American pre-Code action film about the Lower East Side of Manhattan around the start of the 20th century directed by Raoul Walsh and starring Wallace Beery and George Raft. The supporting cast features Jackie Cooper, Fay Wray and Pert Kelton.

Production background

The movie features Beery as saloon owner Chuck Connors, Raft as Steve Brodie, the first man to jump off the Brooklyn Bridge and live, Jackie Cooper as a pugnacious child, Fay Wray as the leading lady, and Pert Kelton as a bawdy young dance hall singer.

The film is an absorbing presentation of the views and behaviors common at the time. The movie opens with a close-up of a saloon window featuring a sign saying "Nigger Joe's" in large letters (the name of an actual Bowery bar from the period). Cooper's character has a habit of throwing rocks at people in Chinatown. When Beery's character berates him for doing so, Cooper's character responds, "They was just Chinks," whereupon Beery immediately softens, saying "Awww..." while affectionately mussing the boy's hair. At one point, Cooper's character breaks a window, knocking over a kerosene lamp and causing a lethal fire that spreads through the block. Frantic Chinese people trapped in the fire are shown desperately trying to escape, followed by a depiction of the ashes of their building in which they presumably died.