The Top Five Film Noirs Starring Humphrey Bogart

I meant to write and post this back during Noirvember, but I got distracted, and then I forgot.

Humphrey Bogart is my favorite actor. He made some incredible films in his storied career (including my all-time favorite, Casablanca), and more than a few of them were film noirs. More than just about any actor of the classic period, his name is (arguably) the one most associated with noir. So I thought it would be fun to do a Top Five favorite noirs starring Bogart.

high sierra movie poster

5. High Sierra (1941)

Bogart wasn’t always the big star we know him as today. He spent the better part of a decade as a supporting player, often billed as a gangster or heavy. High Sierra changed that. He was lucky to get that role, as both Paul Muni and George Raft had been offered it first, and director Raoul Walsh didn’t think he was leading man material. But writer John Huston thought Bogart was perfect for the role, and eventually Walsh relented. Huston would, that very same year, cast Bogart in his film The Maltese Falcon (more on that in a minute).

With this film he hasn’t quite left the gangster mold; he plays Roy Earle, a guy who’s just gotten out of prison and is already set for his next score. He’s holed up in a cabin in the mountains with three other guys and a girl, just waiting for the right time to rob a ritzy hotel. The girl (played by the always great Ida Lupino) will lead to trouble. Bogart is still perfecting his world-weary, cynical, but ultimately sentimental character, but he’s still terrific as Earle. Lupino is great too, and Walsh’s direction is quite wonderful.

the maltese falcon poster

4. The Maltese Falcon (1941)

If High Sierra made Bogart a star, then The Maltese Falcon solidified it. Based on the novel of the same name by Dashiell Hammett, this film is often considered the first truly great film noir. Bogart plays Sam Spade, a tough, cynical private eye who is hired by a woman (Mary Astor) who may not be who she claims to be and may not actually want what she claims to want.

What she really wants is the titular object, which is a mythical, jewel-crusted statue of a bird that was supposedly gifted to the Holy Roman Emperor hundreds of years ago but has been lost to time. While trying to find the bird, Spade will run across a number of eclectic and strange people, including ones played by Peter Lorre and Sydney Greenstreet.

The plot is complicated, the cast is perfect, and John Huston’s direction (it was his directorial debut) is fantastic.

in a lonely plac eposter

3. In a Lonely Place (1950)

This is probably the least noirish film on the list and quite possibly Bogart’s best performance. Based on the excellent novel by Dorothy B. Hughes, Bogart plays a troubled screenwriter with a penchant for violence who hasn’t written a hit movie in years. One night he takes a girl home with him, then changes his mind and kicks her out. The next morning she finds herself dead, and he finds himself a suspect. Through this he’ll meet his neighbor Laura (a magnificent Gloria Grahame), and they’ll fall in love, but she’ll never quite be sure he didn’t kill that girl.

Bogart’s performance is heartbreaking. The script is full of great lines like, “I was born when she kissed me, I died when she left me, and I lived a few weeks while she loved me.” Just a magnificent movie.

key largo poster

02. Key Largo (1948)

Bogart and Lauren Bacall met on the set of To Have and Have Not (1944) and fell in love and stayed together until he died in 1957. They made four films together (three of them are absolute bangers, and the fourth one isn’t bad – one of the others almost made it to this list, and the other is #1).

Directed by John Huston (his second film on this list), Key Largo includes an incredible cast (including Thomas Gomez, Lionel Barrymore, and Edward G. Robinson). Bogart plays Frank McCloud, a former soldier who stops by Key Largo to visit with his dead comrade’s father (Barrymore) and widow (Bacall) but gets stuck when a hurricane rolls in. Also stuck with them are a few gangsters awaiting a car full of cash that they’ll trade for counterfeit bills.

The hurricane and the gangsters make for a pot of dangerous soup that’s ready to boil. This boasts a classic Bogart performance. He’s smart and tough, witty and sensitive. He and Bacall work magic together, and Barrymore is great as the father who doesn’t take any crap. But it is Robinson who steals the show. He gets one of the all-time great introductory scenes and remains awesome throughout.

the big sleep poster

01. The Big Sleep (1946)

I think this was the first film noir I ever watched. Based on the fantastic book by Raymond Chandler, Bogart plays Phillip Marlowe, a private eye hired by an old man over some blackmail scheme involving his youngest daughter (Martha Vickers in a small but oh-so-memorable role). Quickly things turn complicated, convoluted, and murderous (director Howard Hawks famously phoned Raymond Chandler over who killed a certain chauffeur, and Chandler didn’t actually know the answer). But the plot isn’t really the point.

The Big Sleep is all about its mood, its characters, and the way it makes you feel. Bacall is the older daughter and potential love interest. It is a blast watching her flirt with Bogart and become the femme fatale. Everyone flirts with Bogart in this movie. The two sisters, the cab driver, the bookstore clerk—hell, I’d flirt with him if I were in this movie. It is the perfect noir and an absolute blast to watch.

Well, there you have it, my favorite Humphrey Bogart film noirs. Do you have a favorite? Do you disagree with my picks? Honestly, if I wrote this tomorrow I’d probably have different picks. But this was fun. I’ll try to do more of these when I can.

Blackout Noir: Black Angel (1946)

black angel

A man goes to see his ex-wife on their anniversary. She refuses to see him. She has the doorman turn him away. She still refuses even when he’s sent up a fancy brooch. As he’s walking out, another man comes into the hotel asking to see the woman. He’s let up with no problem. The first man goes to a bar and gets drunk. Later, a third man comes to the hotel and is let up to see the woman. He finds her lying on the floor dead. While there he hears someone sneak out. He notices that the brooch she was holding in her hand when he first came in is now missing.

Black Angel was directed by Roy William Neill, who is best known for directing most of the Sherlock Holmes films starring Basil Rathbone. It is a loose adaptation of a novel of the same name by Cornell Woolrich. I was twenty minutes into it before I realized I had seen it before.

The first man is called Martin Blair, and he’s played by Dan Duryea. The guy who found her dead is Kirk Bennett (John Phillips), he’s a married man who was having an affair with the dead lady. But things turned sour, and she was blackmailing him to conceal the affair. The cops figure that’s the motive and arrest him. He’s convicted and sentenced to die in the gas chamber.

Kirk’s wife, Catherine (June Vincent), believes her husband to be innocent and starts her own investigation into the matter. She’ll eventually connect with Martin, and he’ll tell her about the second guy, the one he saw entering the dead woman’s room. That guy is Marko, and he’s played by Peter Lorre, so you automatically know he did it. Catherine and Martin know he did it, too, but they have to prove it. They figure that proof is in a safe inside his upstairs office at the club he owns. They get a gig there as a lounge act.

It is all nicely done, and there are a couple of good and tense scenes with Peter Lorre, but it never quite connected with me. This was Duryea’s first starring role, and he’s good in it. He’s a washout and a drunk who finally sobers up when he meets Catherine. Finding her husband’s killer gives him purpose, and he naturally falls in love with her, which gives him even more purpose. But she’s still in love with her husband. That creates a bit of drama. Peter Lorre is always good, but he’s not given a lot to work with here.

It is a fine movie and worth watching if you are a fan of film noir.

Now Watching: The Maltese Falcon (1941)

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The Maltese Falcon (1941)
Directed and written by John Huston
Based on the novel by Dashiell Hammett

Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor, Sydney Greenstreet, and Peter Lorre

San Francisco private detective Sam Spade takes on a case that involves him with three eccentric criminals, a gorgeous liar, and their quest for a priceless statuette, with the stakes rising after his partner is murdered.

Rating: 9/10

An absolute classic. I love this film. I’ve seen it many times. I’m hoping to do a Top Five Bogart in Film Noir list this month, so I’m watching as many of those as I can. This is often considered the very first film noir, and it is one of the very best. I don’t really have the bandwidth right now to do a full review, but since I watched it, I wanted to at least mention it.

It was the first film directed by John Huston and the first film Sydney Greenstreet ever played in. It made Bogart a star and set the template for untold detective stories to come. It is a terrific film and I higly recommend it.

Noirvember: The Face Behind the Mask (1941)

the face behind the mask poster

Welcome to Noirvember my friends. We begin my most favorite month with a pretty good little film starring Peter Lorre.

He stars as Janos Szabo a just off-the-boat Hungarian immigrant. He is full of hope and love for his new home in New York City. With only a few bucks in his pocket, he’s also relying on the kindness of strangers. Sometimes he finds it.

Sometimes he don’t.

A kindly police officer gives him a meal and directs him to a comfortable, but cheap hotel. A fire is accidentally started by another tenant and Janos’ face is badly burned. His hands, which are full of skill; in clockmaking and airplane mechanics – jobs he had in Hungary, were untouched in the fire.

He should be able to find a job easily. But because of his face, he is turned away at every corner. Desperate, he goes to the docks to throw himself off. There he meets Dinky (George E. Stone) a small-time crook who knows what it means to be at the end of his rope. They become fast friends.

At first, Janos pushes back against Dinky’s criminal instincts, but unable to find a job and desperate to receive an operation that might fix his face, he eventually relents.

Turns out Janos is really good at crime. He becomes the boss of a gang and begins rolling in dough. The plastic surgeon is unable to repair his face, but he gives him a pretty good-looking face mask to wear. But it isn’t enough. People still notice. People still stare.

Then he meets Helen (Evelyn Keyes) who is blind. They fall in love and Janos must decide between his life of crime and the woman he loves.

Peter Lorre is wonderful in the role. His transition from the naive innocent at the beginning of the film to the hard-edged criminal at the end is masterful. But he also maintains a warm heart that we see in his scenes with Helen. Evelyn Keyes is lovely as well.

The story is fine. There are some nice moments and the final scenes are terrific. It takes a fascinating look at the immigrant experience, and how our society so often grinds them into criminals. It really puts Janos through the wringer at every opportunity.

But there was something about it that didn’t quite work for me. Something in the filmmaking I think. It never grabbed me and completely pulled me into the story. But it is a fine film to start Noirvember off with and a good one for Peter Lorre fans.

Noirvember: Black Angel (1946)

black angel poster

This twisty little noir finds Marty (Dan Duryea) teaming up with Catherine (June Vincent) to solve the murder of his wife. The first twist is that Catherine’s husband has already been convicted for that crime. But she still thinks he’s innocent, and Marty doesn’t particularly care for his scheming, femme fatale wife.

He plays piano and she sings pretty good so they decide to team up as an act and get a gig performing at Marko’s club. Marty saw Marko (Peter Lorre) heading into his wife’s apartment just before the murder so they figure he might be the killer.

The proof will be if Marko has a brooch that was stolen from the victim. If he’s got it then he is the killer. There are some nice, tense scenes in which Catherine tries to sway Marko into revealing something, and then later, as she tries to break into his safe.

It is a bit too relaxed to keep the tension going (there are at least two full-on musical numbers in the middle) and a giant red herring causes it to lose a bit of focus, but it is a mostly enjoyable little noir and worth seeking out.

New Pickups

pictures of dvds and book

We spent most of last week just sitting around with family celebrating the life and mourning the death of my brother-in-law Paul. It was a long, difficult week. But we did have a little fun as well. The funeral was on Thursday so on Friday we went bowling and then played Dominoes.

At some point, my wife and I went to McKays, a wonderful little used book/music/movie store and I bought a few things. Honestly, I was pretty much dazed at that point so I didn’t really know what I was looking for so I just grabbed a few things that looked fun.

I am a big fan of boxed sets where you get several movies from an actor, or director, or maybe that cover a theme. These usually don’t include the big named films but will give you some lesser-known films for a cheap price.

The Tough Guys set has three films each from Kirk Douglas, James Cagney, and John Wayne. I’ve not heard of most of them (except The Strange Love of Martha Ivers which I think I already own and is excellent) but I’m looking forward to watching some lesser movies from three actors I really enjoy.

I love me some Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracey. The disks in this collection come in those cheap snap cases, but I’m hoping the movies are good.

For reasons that are beyond me (besides racism) the 1930s found a lot of white actors playing Asian detectives. A number of actors (most famously Warner Oakland) played Charlie Chan in a series of films, Boris Karloff played Mr. Wong and Peter Lorre starred as Mr. Motto.

I’ve seen several of the Chan and Wong films and quite liked them so I’m interested to see what Lorre does as Motto. It is pretty gross watching these very non-Asian actors play Asian characters (often stereotypically so) but I have definitely learned to overlook any number of varying degrees of offensiveness in older films. You really can’t judge films made nearly 90 years ago by 2020 standards. Here’s hoping the actual mysteries are enjoyable.

Lastly, I grabbed another Maigret book. I always look for that series whenever I go to a book store.

What have you all picked up recently?

The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934)

the man who knew too much

I suppose for those who are not Alfred Hitchcock aficionados the version of The Man Who Knew Too Much they know is the one with James Stewart and Doris Day. That’s a fine film in its own right, but most people don’t realize it is a remake of a film from 1934. Both films were directed by Hitchock making him one of the few directors to ever remake themselves.

The earlier film was from the director’s British period and stars Peter Lorre in his first English language movie. It is an excellent film and a few years ago Criterion gave it a humdinger of a Blu-ray release. I reviewed it for Cinema Sentries and you can read that review here.