The Maltese Falcon

Description

One of the finest detective films ever, John Huston's directorial debut stars Humphrey Bogart as San Francisco private eye Sam Spade. Spade takes on mysterious femme fatale Miss Wonderly (Mary Astor) as a client and soon finds himself suspected of murdering his partner and up to his trench coat in the search for the titular jewel-encrusted statue. With Peter Lorre, Sydney Greenstreet (in his film debut), Elisha Cook, Jr. 100 min. Standard; Soundtracks: English DTS HD mono Master Audio, French Dolby Digital mono, Spanish Dolby Digital mono; Subtitles: English (SDH), Spanish, French; audio commentary; newsreel footage; bonus shorts "The Gay Parisian" (1941), "Hiawatha's Rabbit Hunt" (1941), "Meet John Doughboy" (1941); theatrical trailers. Two-disc set. Review: Very well acted secret villains mystery with a surprise ending. Review: If one wished to be brutally objective, "Blood Simple" and "The Usual Suspects" are "better" films than "The Maltese Falcon". But "better" is a relative term, and frankly, they just don't make them like this any more. "The Maltese Falcon" is gritty and unpleasant in a nasty, unsanitary way -- just the antidote for Sonja Henie and Shirley Temple. The Blu-ray transfer is excellent, without apparent grain reduction or edge sharpening. My only complaint is that skin highlights are sometimes burned out, but this is minor. There was no dirt or scratches, but there are occasional density fluctuations. It's hard to imagine a better transfer. The pleasure of seeing classic B&W films in HD on a large screen -- probably better than they ever looked in a theater -- is that one can better appreciate the performances. I never thought much of the younger Bogart as an actor, but I'm starting to develop respect. No one seems to have pointed out the story's misogyny and "male-bonding" -- possibly because the presence of three homosexual characters blinds us to it. Though Sam Spade could have protected Brigid and had her (for a while, anyway), sex is far less important than loyalty to his partner, and the need to avenge his death. By the way, a "gunsel" is not someone who "carries heat" for a criminal -- not in the "firearms" sense, anyway. (This went right past the Production Board.) "Gunsel" comes from a Yiddish word meaning "little goose". When Gutman says he cares for Wilmer as much as if he were his own son -- well, you figure it out. The supplemental material follows the "Warners Night at the Movies" format. It includes one of the first Bugs Bunny cartoons, "Hiawatha's Rabbit Hunt". Absolutely recommended, a necessity in any film collection -- unless you think movies have to be in widescreen and color. PS: There is a valid criticism that /might/ be made of this film. It is not "about" a valuable object disreputable people are searching for, but a story about people lying to each other -- which necessarily results a scene after scene of "talking heads". Showing us what /actually/ happened would make the film more superficially "entertaining" -- but largely destroy the point. "The Maltese Falcon" is a drama about delusion and disillusion -- not a melodrama about crime.