Each Dawn I Die is an elementary prison drama made into a fine movie by the
pairing up of it's two stars, James Cagney and George Raft. Previously they had
worked together in 'Taxi!' where Raft had had a minor role dancing beside Cagney.
This time, their roles were 'slightly' different. They had been friends since their
Broadway days, when both had been dancers.

Frank Ross (Cagney), a muck-raking journalist with idealistic faith American Justice,
is framed in a manslaughter case by a crooked district attorney whom he discovered
in an act of fraud. Unable to get a pardon, disillusioned and embittered, Ross becomes
friendly with hardened lifer Hood Stacey (Raft). He decides to help the convict escape
in exchange for a pledge from Stacey that he will find the man who can finger the
assailants that drenched Ross with alcohol and then rammed his car into an innocent pedestrian. Once outside, Stacey learns that the key gangster he's just been sent to the
prison he has escaped from. Loyal to his vow, Stacey takes a taxi back to the prison
walls and strolls back through the front gates. He joins a suicidal jail break out,
coercing a confession from the gangster within earshot of the prison warden. Stacey is
then shot down and killed by a volley of gunfire.

Raft has a rare mix of talent and composure. The still faced, scratchy-voiced actor,
though well thought of, has never really found his place as a virtuoso of gangster
movies. Each Dawn I Die demonstrates the dignity of his contribution. Perhaps more
suited to the silent era, he can play an entire scene without lines, depending on a slight
flicker of his face and his steely untrusting eyes to communicate his inner feeling.
Frank Ross's fiance (Jane Bryan) implores Stacey for his help in one scene. She tells
the fugitive that the newspaper has gone to 'the hole' for punishment rather than reveal
details of the escape plan

"You're a slum kid who never had a chance " she says, "But so is Frank. He hates
crooked cops and rotten politicians as much as you do. The only difference is you
chose crime - the easy way. He spent his life fighting,"

Raft remains silent, coolly smoking a cigarette in the pointed, informative way he had.
He betrays the gangsters compassion by simply and slow slackening his countenance.
It is a fascinating paring with Cagney giving a strong, convulsive performance, especially
in the unnerving scenes in which starts to come unhinged by prison life and solitary confinement. He breaks down into a screaming, sobbing paroxysm. Ross and Stacey's friendship is so believably developed, sometimes in spite of a wondering story line, to
be almost plausible. As Ross is leaving the prison, exonerated, the warden (George
Bancroft) hands him a photograph left by Stacey before he was killed in the hail of
bullets during the break out It is inscribed "To Ross: I found a square guy."

This movie belongs to it's stars, without them it would have been just another mediocre
'B' movie, they put it among the best.