The Treasure of the Sierra Madre

(Movie Review)

Well, as you can see I've been on a bit of a roll lately with classic movies. And since I've really been enjoying everything I've been renting, I thought I'd keep going on this streak and see where it leads me.

Having had good luck lately with Humphrey Bogart movies, and seeing this in the video store looking like a good old fashioned adventure and bruised elbow movie, I thought I would check it out.

The movie starts out pretty interesting with Humphrey Bogart and his co-star playing down and out Gringos in post-revolutionary Mexico, mostly reduced to begging from other Americans and taking odd jobs (and getting taken advantage of in the process). Then they met an old prospector, and decide to go up in the mountains and look for gold.

It was at this point that I realized where this story was going, and realized I had heard this story a few times before. It's one of the oldest stories in the world: a few good men strike it rich, and then, in spite of themselves, their greed takes over and suddenly their at each other's throats. We've all heard variations of this story in many different movies, books, and fables. It is the kind of story that makes a good 15 minute Sunday School lesson for children, but stretched out over a 2 1/2 hour movie it gets old real fast.

And if it's not obvious enough to you what is going to happen, there's plenty of foreshadowing going on. The old prospector warns them ahead of time what gold does to men. Humphrey Bogart and his friend swear vehemently they will never let that happen to them which, to the viewer with any brains at all, is simply foreshadowing that they of course will become caught up in the gold craze.

From that point on the last two hours of the movie is a case of: "I know where this is going, now I just have to wait for it to get there" as the relationships among the three men slowly deteriorate after they strike it rich.

Fortunately there are a few complications thrown in along the way. For example a fourth man shows up and demands to take part in the gold digging expedition. And then all four men end up getting caught in the cross fire between the federales and the bandidos.

I didn't know it until I was watching it, but it turns out this movie is where the (slightly misquoted) famous line: "Badges? We don't need no stinking badges!" comes from. I always used to wonder what the hell everyone was talking about when they referenced that line. Another one of life's mysteries solved.

(Wikipedia article here on movie line and its cultural relevance. Isn't wikipedia great?)

But then the story returns to the same old children's fable about 3 men fighting among themselves because of the treasure they found.

The acting and directing in this movie is all top notch. But the story was slightly too predictable for my taste.

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The Treasure of the Sierra Madre: Movie Review (Scripted)