Farrell MacDonald Det. Tom Polhouse as Det. Tom Polhouse. Agostino Borgato Capt. John Jacobi as Capt. John Jacobi uncredited. Roy Del Ruth. More like this. Watch options. Storyline Edit. Sam Spade is quite the womanizer. When his secretary tells him the new customer waiting outside his office is a knockout, he wastes no time before seeing her.
It turns out she's a knockout with money. And she wants to spend it on his services as a private detective. She has some story about wanting to protect her sister. Neither he nor his partner, Miles Archer, believes it. But with the money she's paying, who cares?
The job proves to be more dangerous than either of them expected. It involves not just the lovely dame with the dangerous lies, but also the sweaty Casper Gutman, the fey Joel Cairo, and the thuggish young Wilmer Cook. Three crooks, and all of them are looking for the statuette of a black bird they call the Maltese Falcon.
Hard as nails, leader of a crime ring, but still a woman. Strange that she should fall for the one man who knew her love game too well! Crime Drama Film-Noir Mystery. Did you know Edit. Trivia When originally sold to television in the s, the title was changed to "Dangerous Female" in order to avoid confusion with its illustrious remake, The Maltese Falcon Fifty years later, Turner Classic Movies restored its original title card.
However, as recently as April 27, , the service used by cable companies to provide data for their viewing guides used the "Dangerous Female" title for TCM's showing of the movie on that date. Goofs The same prop is used for the suitcase that Spade finds in Miss Wonderly's room and the suitcase which contains the falcon. The travel stickers are identical on each one. Quotes Effie Perrine : Sam, it's a gorgeous new customer.
Burke and Al Dubin. User reviews 43 Review. Top review. Although it received favorable reviews and did a brisk business at the box office, like many early talkies it was soon eclipsed by ever-advancing technology and forgotten--until television, with its endless demands for late-late show material, knocked on Hollywood's door. It is a myth that the advent of sound forced directors to lock down the camera, but it is true that many directors preferred simple camera set-ups in early sound films; it gave them one less thing to worry about.
The performing decisions made by the various actors are also illustrative and informative, particularly re leads Ricardo Cortez and Bebe Daniels.
Cortez is still clearly performing in the "silent mode," and he reads as visually loud; Daniels, however, has elected to underplay, and while she is stiff by current standards, her performance must have seemed startlingly innovative at the time.
And then there are two performers who are very much of the technology: Una Merkle as Spade's secretary and Thelma Todd as Iva Archer, both of whom seem considerably more comfortable with the new style than either Cortez or Daniels. The film is also interesting as a "Pre-Code" picture, for it is sexually explicit in ways most viewers will not expect from a s film, and indeed it is surprisingly explicit even in comparison to other pre-code films. Hero Sam Spade is a womanizer who seduces every attractive female who crosses his path--and the film opens with a shot of just such a woman pausing to straighten her stockings before leaving his office.
Still later, the dubious Miss Wonderly tempts Spade with her cleavage, lolls in his bed after a thick night, splashes in his bathtub, and finally winds up stripped naked in his kitchen!
But then there is the justly celebrated version starring Humphrey Bogart and Mary Astor under the direction of John Huston. Both the and films lifted great chunks of dialogue from Hammett's novel, and very often the dialogue is line-for-line the same. The whole look of the film is entirely too glossy. Spade is a sleazy Depression-era private investigator but his apartment looks like it is set up for visiting royalty. The place is huge!
And it sports all the latest mod cons. If the P. In the plus column, Walter Long and Thelma Todd were good in their small parts as Archer and his wife. Long as a lunk and Todd as a bombshell. Smart casting, that. And I thought Una Merkel was the single best thing about the film. Three cheers for Una! I cannot think of a more adorable smile in all of classic filmdom.
Undoubtedly, the biggest adaptation mistake that the movie makes is creating a witness to the murder of Archer. A Chinese gentleman saw Wonderly and names her as the killer.
Spade, who conveniently speaks fluent Chinese, talks to the man immediately after the murder. So, he has an eyewitness who can identify the killer and who does so at the eventual trial.
The police are breathing down his neck, he has an impartial witness to the murder who can clear him in a heartbeat and he just sits on this information? However, Spade did not have the proof he needed and continued to play the game in order to gather evidence. Having an eyewitness means that he did a whole lot of work for nothing. Spade is an insatiable womanizer in this version he definitely liked the ladies in the book but the screenwriters dialed this tendency up to 11 but having him risk his neck just to chase after a tomato contradicts his pragmatic character.
Note his speech at the grand finale. Then, as a final insult to its source material, the movie tacks on a happy-ish ending. He uses his influence to get her tobacco and chocolate in prison. The end. Um, yay? So, the version is something of a disappointment. It messes with its source novel but none of its changes can be described as improvements. I can see why it would appeal to fans of pre-Code cinema but the version is considered definitive for a reason.
Director John Huston reportedly loved the novel and greatly disliked the previous versions with their tacked-on semi-happy endings. Oh and one final note. Some folks seem to have the idea that Cortez looked more like the book Spade than Bogart did.
Not really. Neither man looked much like the book version. Spade was described as tall one point for Cortez , blond, pink complected, having a v-shaped mouth and sloped shoulders.
Bebe Daniels was born in Dallas, Texas in A precocious child actress, she made her first confirmed screen appearance in Her second appearance was in the very first movie version with caveats of The Wizard of Oz , where it is generally accepted that she played the part of Dorothy.
Her spunk and devilish charm caught the eye of Cecil B. DeMille, who offered her a contract at Paramount. The comedienne was refashioned as a cynical vamp. Daniels spent the rest of the silent era at Paramount. She soon discarded her vamp persona and returned to her comedy roots. She specialized is making gender-reversed spoofs of popular films and proto-screwball comedies. Then sound arrived. Daniels bought out her own contract and then signed on with RKO.
Her starring role in Rio Rita proved that she had both the voice and the singing ability to stay on top. At this point, she was nearly a two-decade veteran of the movies and was not yet thirty.
As one of the most successful silent-to-talkie transitions, she continued her reign of mischief in pre-Code films. Her career slowed near the middle of the decade so she and husband Ben Lyon relocated to London. An abduction threat aimed at her daughter provided further incentive to move housekeeping. When the second world war broke out, Daniels and Lyon stayed in London through the Blitz. In her capacity as entertainer to the troops, Daniels was the first woman to land on Normandy after D-Day.
After the war, she remade herself again as a radio sitcom star. Life with the Lyons was a fictionalized version of the world of Ben and Bebe and it proved to be enormously popular.
At this point, Daniels had been in the motion picture game for 45 years. Daniels passed away in but she remains one of the most vibrant personalities of the silent era. On the surface, Jacob Krantz had all the prerequisites for super-stardom. Tall, handsome, intelligent… What more could you ask for? Born in New York to Austrian immigrant parents, Jacob was cast in his first film while still in his teens. Unfortunately, during an action scene, a punch from star Milton Sills accidentally connected and the result was six stitches to the head and his scenes cut.
A huge box office draw, Valentino wanted more money and higher-quality films. Jesse L. Lasky spotted Krantz, noted his physical resemblance to Valentino and knew he had found a successor. Of course, he had to have a properly Latin name so he was dubbed Ricardo Cortez and his birthplace was moved to sunny Spain.
The newly-christened Mr. Cortez did not speak Spanish. I know it was the silent era but this was not the wisest choice considering that the greater Los Angeles area is and was home to a large number of, you know, actual Spanish-speakers but then I am not a big time producer so what do I know?
The deception was soon discovered It was then claimed that Cortez was born in Austria. Which is near Spain. Or something.
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