The Bowery (1933 film)

The Bowery is a 1933 American PreCode 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.

The film is an absorbing presentation of the views and behaviors common at the time. The movie opens with a closeup of a saloon window featuring a sign saying Nigger Joes in large letters the name of an actual Bowery bar from the period. Coopers character has a habit of throwing rocks at people in Chinatown. When Beerys character berates him for doing so, Coopers character responds, They was just Chinks, whereupon Beery immediately softens, saying Awww... while affectionately mussing the boys hair. At one point, Coopers 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.In the Gay Nineties, on New Yorks Bowery, saloon owner Chuck Connors Beery, finds that his rival, Steve Brodie Raft, has thrown a muskmelon at his window. The happygolucky Brodie explains that he threw the melon on a dare. As Connors threatens to fight him, the two learn of a fire in neighboring Chinatown. Both men call upon their volunteer fire brigades, and wager 100 on which will be the first to throw water on the fire. ........

Source: Wikipedia