Dark Passage (1947)

The Romance is what gets me!

With characters dropping like flies, Bacall, blinded by love, refuses to believe what anybody would believe (and she's right!). The scene where he leaves, never to see her again is perfect. The call from the bus station, the way he stammers through his instructions. The scene in Pieta, Peru where they see each other and, without a word, she moves into his arms and they begin to dance. The convoluted plot twists and turns...but the romance of this movie is a beautiful thing. July 11, 2008

A mystery with a love affair

The man in the bandaged face, the taxi cab driver with the quickie
face job (plastic surgery) friend and the trash can escape from San Quentin.
I didn't know how frail and thin the tough guy Bogart was
until I saw this movie with older eyes. The acting, plot and 40's San Francisco made this very good viewing. The music wasn't as good
as some of these films, but there is a chemistry her
that time hasn't erased. May 14, 2008

Bogie as a bandaged killer and Bacall the woman by his side

Vincent Parry (Humphrey Bogart) has just escaped from San Quentin where he has been imprisoned for the murder of his wife. Vincent is innocent and wants to clear his name so once he is a free man he goes in search of the people who testified against him at his trial. However not only is he a convicted murderer but he is now a fugitive and the cops will be looking for him everywhere. After narrowly escaping after the man who picks him up a few miles from the prison tries to detain him after learning of his identity Vincent is rescued by a woman named Irene Jansen (Lauren Bacall). Irene has followed Vincent's trial every step of the way and believes him to have been framed. She offers to transport Vincent past the roadblock and over the Golden Gate Bridge. She even offers to put him up and gets him a new wardrobe. Vincent is suspicious of her and leaves her house that night and meets up with a cabbie. The cabbie recognizes him but tells him that he knows a surgeon who could change Vincent's face and make him unrecognizable. Vincent undergoes surgery that morning and the doctor tells him that he must not take off the bandages for a couple of weeks until he is completely healed. This makes Dark Passage an interesting film. The premise of having surgery so that you are unrecognizable while seeking revenge is interesting to find in a film noir but more importantly Bogart is only onscreen as Bogart for forty minutes. The majority of the film is him in bandages. Studio head Jack Warner was not happy about this as we learn in the making of doc included on this disc and Bogart himself was surprised that he was getting paid the money he was since he would not be recognizable for over half of the film. After the bandages come off Vincent sets off to clear his name but things get worse for him. A friend from his past has turned up dead and he is the number one suspect. All kinds of people from Vincent's past emerge who threaten to turn him in unless he pays them off. The film is pretty entertaining but not great. Bogart and Bacall are fantastic together naturally and this film has a wonderfully colorful cast of supporting characters. Agnes Moorhead plays Madge one of the people who testified against Vincent at his trial. Madge fears for her life knowing that Vincent will come looking for her so she seeks shelter with Irene who can't stand her. The cabbie who recommends the surgery and the surgeon himself are terrific in their brief roles. Director Delmer Daves shot on location in San Francisco and that choice lends the film a lot of authenticity. Overall it is an interesting film and Bogart and Bacall are an unbeatable pair who are surrounded by a lot of colorful characters. April 28, 2008

Effective film noir

Dark Passage is less of a partnership between them than are other Bogart-Bacall movies .He is very much the star in this picture while she has a much less impactful role .This may be one reason that for all its qualities -and it has many-the movie lags a little way behind their other collaborations .
Bogart plays Vincent Parry who escapes from San Quentin whence he had been sent for the murder of his wife.He is picked up by Irene Jansen (Bacall) a woman long obsessed with the case and who believes him to be innocent .She hides him in her San Francisco apartment from which base he venyures out to visit an unlicensed plastic surgeon who give him a new face -that of Bogart.He uses this disguise to dodge the police and go in search of the real killer bu=y so doing clear his name .

A year previously The Lady in The Lake ,starring Robert Montgomery ,had made use of the subjective camera filming the action through the eyes of its hero Phillip Marlowe.Dark Passage deploys a similar technique and we see the action in the opening half of the movie through Parry's eyes .It is only when the bandages are removed after surgery that we glimpse Bogart .Frankly,it doesn't work .We know the man is Bogart ,if only for the voice over narration being delivered in his unmistakeable tones.The Bacall-Bogart chemistry is strangely muted here and it is really only in the romantic dinner sequence with Too Marvellous For Words playing in the background that the relationship between their characters really takes wing .
The stars are fine as ever but are not helped by a convoluted screenplay by future director Delmer Daves .Acting honours are stolen by Agnes Moorehead who looks very scary indeed in the movie and the cameos from tom D'Andrea as a cabbie and Clifton Young as a small time crook give proceedings a decided lift.
The opening is sharp and pithy and it does sustain interest but it is not a top drawer movie -simply solid entertainment but without the cutting edge of such pictures as The Big Sleep February 9, 2008

Bad Bogart film

The premise of the film is very interesting. But this is the worst of the Bogart movies I've seen. This movie is badly written. Bogarts wise cracks are badly timed within the dialog- it seem the line should be funny within the context of the dialog, but the lines instead seem isolated from the tone and emotion, adding nothing to the scenes.
There are many problems with the editing. There are several places where they seemed to have ran out of film or had no pickup shots.
Hollywood should remake this film... they can only improve on it.
There are plenty of good Bogart films out there, this is not one of them. January 1, 2008

More reviews at Amazon.com ...