Key Largo

(Movie Review)

Another old classic movie. I figure well I'm on a roll, I might as well keep working through the classic movie section at my local video store. So far I've really been enjoying myself.

This is another film with Humphrey Bogart. And, like "The Big Sleep", he's paired up with Lauren Bacall again. (I think the two of them were married by this point, so they appeared opposite each other in a lot of movies).

My video store had this DVD in their "Hard Boiled" section, right alongside "The Big Sleep" and "The Maltese Falcon". Of course you always have to be careful about those labels, especially when you're in a foreign country and things don't always get translated well.

There's no denying this is a gangster movie, but I usually think of a hard boiled movie having a detective and maybe a mystery in it as well. From my perspective this is more of a "film noir". Although maybe not even that. (Aren't film noirs supposed to be dark and mysterious?) Maybe I'd just call this a gangster flick and leave it at that.

Okay, enough babbling about the genre. Onto the movie itself...
Humphrey Bogart plays an ex-soldier who goes down to the Florida Keys after the war to meet the father and wife of someone killed under his command. While he is visiting with them, it turns out that the mob boss Johnny Rocco (played by Edward G. Robinson) is using that hotel to stage his come back. Everyone in the hotel is taken hostage. And then the typhoon comes in.

Humphrey Bogart plays a character very similar to his character of Rick in "Casablanca": the reluctant hero who is disillusioned with ideals, and whose only ambition is to stay out of trouble. But, like Casablanca, events eventually force a crisis in which he is forced to act.

This film was made in 1948, and there is a lot of discussion about what kind of place the world is going to be after the big war is over, and whether mobsters and lowlife like Johnny Rocco are going to be able to flourish in the postwar world, or whether evil was wiped out with the fall of Hitler. The film bites off a little bit more than it can chew on some of this, and the philosophical questions are never really adequately dealt with or answered properly. But it still stands as an interesting time piece about the kind of things that were on people's minds immediately after the war.

All in all the film is watchable, but not outstanding. It certainly doesn't hold a candle to "The Big Sleep", "The Maltese Falcon" or "Casablanca", but it was a pleasant enough couple hours watching it. It moves at a slow pace, but once you get used to that I think these old films are really good at story telling, probably because they aren't reliant on special effects.

This film also stars Edward G. Robinson as the gangster boss. I had never heard of Edward G. Robinson before, but a little internet research reveals he was once a big star and at the time of this film more famous than Humphrey Bogart. He was primarily typecast for gangster roles, which isn't surprising based on his face. And, according to wikipedia, he is the basis for Chief Wiggum in "The Simpsons".

Since I consider myself a classic film buff, I'm slightly embarrassed to admit that I never heard of Edward G. Robinson. On the other hand, I imagine I'm probably pulling about average for my generation. (How many of you out there knew who Edward G. Robinson was?) People who grew up during the classic movie era obviously know all the stars. And even the baby boomers grew up with classic movies being re-run on TV and Saturday Matinees. But I think our generation, the post "Star Wars" generation, is the first generation to grow up largely ignorant of classic films. After Spielberg and Lucas came along, classic films just couldn't compete with all the punches being thrown by the new film makers, and we had too many other entertainment options available.

That's my theory anyway.

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Key Largo: Movie Review (Scripted)