The Maltese Falcon (1941)

The Maltese Falcon (1941)

starring Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor

directed by John Huston

100 minutes

Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogart) is accused by the police of murdering Miles Archer, his business partner. Archer was killed while working a case that was brought to them by Brigid O'Shaughnessy (Mary Astor). Spade was having an affair with Archer's wife at the time.

O'Shaughnessy turns out to have more up her sleeve than she originally told Spade and Archer. She is being pursued by three men who believe she knows the whereabouts of the titular Maltese Falcon.

Spade gets involved in the search for the bird when Joel Cairo (Peter Lorre) one of the men searching for the falcon, comes to see him at his office. Spade soon notices Wilmer (Elisha Cook Jr.) tailing him. Wilmer works for Kasper Gutman (Sidney Greenstreet).

Spade does his best to play the different men off against one another and figure out which one killed Archer.

Thoughts

This is the second film of this title. I watched the 1931 version of The Maltese Falcon earlier this year. I first watched this movie during the 1980s. I recall liking it then. I'm not sure I'm ready to give it the high marks that it gets from some reviewers. It starts a bit slow. Spade's motivations seem a bit unclear in the early going based on the way Bogart plays the character.

I like this version better than the 1931 version. Bogart is a big improvement over Ricardo Cortez who played the part of Spade in the earlier version of the film. Huston does some interesting things with close-ups and camera angles that add to the visual presentation of the story. There are some other differences between the first and second versions of the film although the story for the most part remains the same. 

I watched this movie at the AFI Silver movie theater. There was a man in the row in front of me who laughed considerably more at the movie than anyone else in the theater. It was a bit distracting, to say the least. I was thinking about borrowing the DVD of the movie from the library and watching it that way until I saw that it was going to be screened theatrically in my neck of the woods.

I might still check the movie out on DVD in the not too distant future. It might be a better experience and the DVD version that the library has includes lots of extras.

I saw this movie at the AFI Silver Theater. It was part of the American Film Institute's celebration of the 100th Anniversary of Warner Bros. See also AFI - Warner Bros Centennial for more films that I saw as part of this program.