Snappy dialogue by John Lee Mahin and James Edward Grant, good performances all round, (including an Oscar-winning turn from Van Heflin), and excellent direction by Mervyn LeRoy all contribute to making "Johnny Eager" one of the most enjoyable gangster films of the early forties.
A surprisingly good Robert Taylor is Johnny, an ex-con who hides his Mr. Big status from the parole board by posing as a simple taxi driver and a gorgeous, twenty year old Lana Turner is the rich prosecutor's daughter who falls for him. It's not a great film by any means but it's a cracking entertainment that stands up to repeated viewings.
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