Bogart and Bacall. Those three words always bring a smile to my face. They point to an enchanting onscreen chemistry than spanned four movies and eventually into their offscreen lives. Bacall’s beauty and saucy smarts was always the perfect match for Bogie’s cool tough guy. “Dark Passage” was the third movie that the headline-grabbing couple made together and at the time Bogart was the highest paid actor in Hollywood. The great Delmer Daves directed and wrote the screenplay for this clever film noir that had several unique tricks up its sleeve.
This film opens with a tense and brilliantly crafted jailbreak. Actually we never see the inside of San Quentin but we spot a man hiding in a barrel being driven off in a truck. Just down the road from the prison the barrel rolls off and the man is loose. Through a number of cool bits of camera trickery we never see the face of the escaped convict although we do hear his voice. Instead everything in this opening sequence is shown to us in first person. This treats the audience to a number of tricky perspectives that Daves pulls off beautifully. We learn from a radio alert than the convict’s name is Vincent Parry (Bogart) and he’s wanted for the murder of his wife.
Parry is picked up by a mysterious young woman named Irene Jansen (Bacall). We learn that Irene is sympathetic towards Parry after believing he didn’t get a fair shake during his trial. She sneaks him past roadblocks and into San Francisco where he sets out to find his one and only friend George (Rory Mallinson). He also connects with a back-alley plastic surgeon who attempts to alter his appearance. Now keep in mind, up to this point we still haven’t seen Vincent’s face. Bogart works in the shadows or strictly through voice work from the first person perspective. After the surgery we finally see him only in full facial bandages. It’s not until about an hour in that the bandages are removed and we see Bogie’s mug for the first time.
We see the few central players during the first half of the film but it isn’t until Parry’s new face is revealed (in the image of Bogart) that the story changes direction. It becomes Parry’s quest to clear his name and to find out who really killed his wife. While the unfolding mystery is an interesting shift it is also a weakness. For such a dramatic setup, the revelation itself is pretty lightweight and how things unfold seems a little too on the nose. It’s not that it’s awful, but there was clearly room for a stronger and better conceived mystery.
Despite that, “Dark Passage” is still a wonderful movie because of the cool and stylish camera work, the great San Francisco locations, and the sizzling chemistry between Bogart and Bacall. There are also some really nice supporting performances from Bruce Bennett, Tom D’Andrea, Agnes Moorehead, and Rory Mallinson. “Dark Passage” sometimes gets lost in the conversations about Bogart and Bacall’s collaborations, but it’s a clever noir that does several things to set itself apart. It may soften up a tad in the third act but it is still a ton of fun.
One of the signature movies of the 1980’s was Tony Scott’s “Top Gun”. It was all the buzz and it put Tom Cruise on the bedrrom walls of teenaged girls everywhere. But the movie was also scarred by a tragic accident during the filming of one of the many air combat scenes. Art Scholl, one of the most renowned aerobatics pilots of the time, was killed after putting his plane in a flat spin for one of the movie’s key scenes. While getting some camera shots himself, Scholl would radio in that he had a serious problem. He was unable to recover and his plane crashed into the Pacific Ocean. Neither Scholl or the plane was ever recovered leaving the full cause of the accident still in question. It was such a tragedy and the finished “Top Gun” movie was dedicated to Art Scholl.
Regarded as a huge flop, “The Conqueror” remains a shining example of what not to do when making a film. It starts with the terrible casting decisions most notably John Wayne as Genghis Kahn. But the film would be remembered for something far more tragic. “The Conqueror” was filmed around St. George, Utah less than 150 miles from a government nuclear test site in Nevada. For weeks the cast and crew worked within the vicinity of the tests. It wasn’t until later that the effects of the tests would be revealed. Despite the government’s assurance, 91 cast and crew members died from cancers that are believed to have resulted from nuclear fallout. All of the main cast including John Wayne, Susan Hayward, Agnes Moorehead, Pedro Armendariz, and John Hoyt were cancer casualties as was director Dick Powell.
Bruce Lee was an amazing martial artist and action movie star. Sadly his life ended early on a movie set. Years later his son Brandon Lee, also an accomplished martial artist, found a place in the action pictures of the late 80’s and early 90’s. His most popular film was “The Crow” from 1993. It would turn out to be his last movie. With only eight days of filming left Brandon Lee was killed when a gun prop fired a live round. The accident occurred during an action scene involving a shootout. A lodged live round was mistakenly fired which struck Lee in the abdomen. He would die a short time later after the bullet lodged in his spine. Many called the accident a Lee family “curse”. I think it’s simply a horrible tragedy that took the life of a great up and coming action star.
In 1983 Steven Spielberg and John Landis co-produced “Twilight Zone: The Movie”, a collection of four shorts bookended by a prologue and epilogue. It was based on the classic TV show and I remember seeing it in the theater. But the movie was forever scarred by a gruesome and horrific accident that took place on the set. In a segment about a racist who ends up in the shoes of the different groups he hates, the great actor Vic Morrow and two young children were tragically killed in a scene where they were fleeing from a helicopter. Pyrotechnics caused the pilot to lose control of the low-flying chopper and it crashed on Morrow and the two children he was carrying. Both Morrow and one of the children were decapitated while the other was crushed. Scandal followed after it was learned the use of the two children broke numerous rules including several of California’s child labor laws. Landis never took any kind of responsibility for the accident which forever soiled his relationship with Spielberg. Most importantly is that three people lost their lives in a heartbreaking tragedy that probably could have been avoided.
Keith & the Movies 