DARK PASSAGE (director/writer: Delmar Daves; screenwriter: from David Goodis' novel; cinematographer: Sid Hickox; editor: David Weisbart; cast: Humphrey Bogart (Vincent Parry), Lauren Bacall (Irene Jansen), Bruce Bennett (Bob), Agnes Moorehead (Madge Rapf), Tom D' Andrea (Sam, cabbie), Clifton Young (Baker), Douglas Kennedy (Detective), Rory Mallinson (George Fellsinger), Houseley Stevenson (Dr. Walter Coley); Runtime: 106; 1947)
Reviewed by Dennis Schwartz
I enjoyed this film much better than when I first saw it in a theater many years ago, as I watched this B/W noir thriller recently on TMC and got a better feel for this fugitive on-the-run film, one that spawned a new genre. The film is based on Davis Goodis' novel about Vincent Parry (Bogart) an innocent man convicted of murdering his wife, who escapes from his life sentence in San Quentin, has plastic surgery only on his face, and tries to clear his name while being aided by an attractive, wealthy young woman, Irene Jansen (Bacall), whose father was just executed in San Quentin, after being framed for her stepmother's murder. Delmar Daves, the writer/director, has done a more than credible job in catching the tense atmosphere involving the characters and the San Francisco locale. The film is almost stolen by bizarre performances by both Agnes Moorhead as the nosey Madge, and by Clifton Young as Baker, the small-time hood with the crooked smile and the even more crooked heart.
Parry is never seen, as we only hear his voice for about an hour into the film, seeing a picture of him only in the newspaper as an escapee, as he tells his tale from his subjective viewpoint. This method of filming, puts us in the convict's shoes, as from his angle of vision we first see him as a shadowy figure escaping from prison, rolling down a hill and heading for San Francisco. The hard-lucked Parry hitches a ride with the much too inquisitive Baker. When it is evident that he is recognized by the man, Parry punches him out, whereby he is quickly given a lift by the artist Irene, who just happens by. He is surprised that she knows all about him and is offering to help him escape, but as reluctant as he is to get her involved in his plight, he needs her help, as there is a police roadblock and he must get back to San Francisco to figure out who framed him and why.
She takes him back to her swell pad, buys him new fancy clothes, gives him a thousand dollars, but while she is out shopping, Parry is listening to some swing music, and Irene's friend, the one who coincidentally gave the false testimony that convicted Parry at the trial, Madge, rings the doorbell, and leaves after Parry in a muffled voice tells her to beat it. Parry is convinced she will return and decides to flee the country.
Inside Sam's (D' Andrea) taxi, Parry is told that he looks like he's in trouble but has an innocent face. The cabbie says that he's an expert at determining if a person is good or evil by just looking at the person. He decides to help by taking Parry to a plastic surgeon (Stevenson), who performs a 90 minute operation on him, telling him that he made him look older and unrecognizable from his old appearance, but that he must keep the bandages on for a few days. Parry only has one close friend that he trusts, a good-hearted soul, George (Rory), who doesn't bother anyone, just plays the trumpet and whose only ambition is to go someday to Peru. When Parry returns from the surgery, he goes to his friend's apartment hoping that he can take care of him till he heals, but he finds George bludgeoned to death on the floor and realizes he is being framed again. As he rushes out of the apartment, he sees Baker's car parked in front of the house. When he reaches Irene's house, the only other person he feels he can turn to for help, he collapses in her hallway, where she revives him as he tells her why he is here again. The next morning she shows him the newspaper story, which accuses him of killing his friend.
Madge comes over, with Parry hiding in the bedroom, as she tells Irene she is scared that Parry will kill her and wants to stay there. Also in the apartment is Bob (Bennett), who has a Platonic relationship with Irene, but was a former boyfriend of Madge's. Eventually Irene gets Bob to take Madge home. Before the dawn comes up, Parry takes off his bandages, and it turns out that he looks just like Humphrey Bogart.
He once again leaves Irene's place, planning to leave the country. The hard-luck fugitive, even with a different face, still gets stopped by a cop while in a diner and has to make a daring escape from him. But he is soon picked up in his hotel room by the wormy Baker, who was following him all this time. He holds a gun on him, and tells him that he wants Irene to give him $60,000 to keep quiet or else he'll tell the police and collect a $5,000 reward.
Once in the car heading toward Irene's, Parry out tricks Baker and gets the jump on him. While questioning him, he learns that it was Madge who tailed him to George's and Irene's place, and figures out that she is the one who murdered both George and his wife. When Baker makes a lunge to take away the gun from Parry, he stumbles off the cliff and dies from the fall.
Parry then goes to Madge's place and confronts her, gets her to confess, but she will not sign the confession, as she tells him no one will believe him. When they tussle in front of her window, she falls fatally to the street. Afraid that no one but Irene will believe he is innocent, he flees to Peru, where he will rendezvous with her, as the last shot shows them happily dancing in a beautiful oceanfront nightclub.
The use of the first person point-of-view camera through the film's first thirty minutes, was interesting and actually better done than the use of such a similar camera gimmick in "Lady in the Lake," which did it an year earlier. What makes this noir slightly different than others, is that Bogart's troubles are from external matters, not from his own character flaws, like in most noir film. His problem is that he got into a situation where it is not likely the law Establishment will believe him. The fatalism commonly developed in the internal structures of most noir protagonists, is just not relevant to the Bogart character, who ends up in a happy relationship with the one he loves, anyway.
REVIEWED ON 9/20/2000 GRADE: B+
Dennis Schwartz: "Ozus' World Movie Reviews"
http://www.sover.net/~ozus
ozus@sover.net
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