Humphrey Bogart Collection [DVD]

Essential, 13 Jan 2009

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M. J. Mooney “villafan82″ (Leeds, West Yorkshire) –

  

Like Mr Craig, I also had duplication problems here – although in my case it was just “Casablanca” I had to buy again. There was good news even there, though: my existing copy was the single-disc edition; this box set includes the two-disc version, with all the “extras”. So the old disc has been passed on to my daughter, and I have this wonderful set.

It has to be said that this “Signature Collection” series is commendable – the compilers have for once done the decent thing and bundled the best films together – “all killer, no filler” – unlike some other packages I could name; the similar Bogart/Bacall (To Have and Have Not, Big Sleep, Dark Passage & Key Largo) and James Cagney vol. 1 (Public Enemy, Angels with Dirty Faces, Roaring Twenties & White Heat) are also essential purchases for the same reason.

Great films at a bargain price.

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Here’s looking at you, kid …, 11 Mar 2004

By 

Themis-Athena (from somewhere between California and Germany) –

  

aaahhh … Bogey. AFI’s No. 1 film star of the 20th century. Hollywood’s original noir anti-hero, epitome of the handsome, cynical and oh-so lonesome wolf, who played the Top 4 [Rick Blaine] and Top 32 [Philip Marlowe] guys on the AFI’s 20th century Top 50 film heroes list; looking unbeatably cool in his fedora, a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth. Endowed with a legendary aura several times larger than his real life stature, and still admired by scores of women wishing they had been born 50+ years earlier, preferably somewhere in California and to parents connected with the movie business, so as to have at least a marginal chance of meeting him.

This set contains some of Bogart’s greatest successes; career-defining moments for both him and his female costars – now all of them Hollywood legends in their own right. Yet, looking at these movies’ and their stars’ almost mythical fame (“Casablanca,” on the AFI list of Top 100 20th century movies second only to “Citizen Kane,” and at No. 23 “The Maltese Falcon” not too far behind) it is difficult to imagine that, produced at the height of the studio system era, each of them was originally just one of the roughly 50 movies released over the course of one year. But mass production didn’t equal low quality; on the contrary, the great care given to all production values, from script-writing to camera work, editing, score and the stars’ presentation in the movies themselves and in their trailers, was at least partly responsible for their lasting success. So, the release of “The Big Sleep” was delayed for a year not only because its first version was completed around the end of WWII and Warner Brothers wanted to get their still-unreleased war movies into theaters first, but also, significantly, because Bacall’s agent convinced director Howard Hawks to reshoot several scenes to better highlight the sassy, mysterious new star 19-year-old Bacall had become after her first movie with Bogart, the 1943 realization of Ernest Hemingway’s “To Have and Have Not” (likewise directed by Hawks and scripted by William Faulkner and Jules Furthman; conversely to “The Big Sleep,” however, without any input from Leigh Brackett). And even more famously, the screenplay for “Casablanca” was constantly rewritten even throughout the filming process, to the point that particularly Ingrid Bergman was extremely worried because she was unsure whether at the end she (Ilsa) would leave Casablanca with Victor Laszlo (Paul Henreid) or stay there with Rick (Bogart).

“The Maltese Falcon” (1941), directed by John Huston and based on Dashiell Hammett’s 1930 like-named novel, transformed Bogart’s on-screen persona from the tough, often two-dimensional gangsters he had portrayed before (beginning with the 1936 adaptation of Robert Sherwood’s “Petrified Forest” where, like in its 1934 stage production, Bogart had starred opposite Leslie Howard, with Bette Davis as the female lead). Imbuing his tough guy shell with a softer core, Bogart instantly became Hammett’s Sam Spade and, moreover, the film noir anti-hero per se; a role that stayed with him throughout the rest of his career, and in which he still remains virtually unparalleled.

“Casablanca” (1942), directed by Michael Curtiz, was based on Murray Burnett and Joan Alison’s play “Everybody Comes to Rick’s,” but renamed by the studio which wanted to tag onto the success of its 1938 hit “Algiers” (starring Charles Boyer and Hedy Lamarr). Further expanding Bogart’s increasingly complex on-screen personality, it added a romantic quality which had heretofore been missing (eventually making this the AFI’s Top 20th century love story, even before the No. 2 “Gone With the Wind”), with a unique, inimitable blend of drama, passion, humor, exotic North African atmosphere, patriotism, unforgettable score (courtesy of “As Time Goes By,” Max Steiner and Louis Kaufman’s violin) and an all-star cast, consisting besides Bogart, Bergman and Henreid of Claude Rains (Captain Renault), Dooley Wilson (who, a drummer by trade, had to fake his piano playing as Rick’s friend Sam), Conrad Veidt (Major Strasser) and again Sydney Greenstreet (Ferrari) and Peter Lorre (Ugarte). And the movie’s countless famous one-liners have long attained legendary status in their own right …

“The Big Sleep” reprised Bogart’s noir gumshoe role, this time based on Raymond Chandler’s first (1939) Philip Marlowe novel. Despite the stellar caliber of its screen writers, the movie is as infamous as Chandler’s book for its labyrinthine plot, which reportedly even Chandler himself couldn’t completely untangle (nor did he care to). Both on and off screen it solidified the chemistry between Bogart and Bacall, who married before its 1946 release, and firmly established then-22-year-old Lauren Bacall as one of Hollywood’s new leading ladies.

“Key Largo” (1948) finally, directed by John Huston, was Bogart and Bacall’s last on-screen collaboration and also constituted a reversal of…

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