Title: High Sierra
Year: 1941
Director: Raoul Walsh
Country: US
Language: English
In the 1930's Warner Bros. were the kings of making gangster pictures like Public Enemy (1931) and Scarface (1932). They had sought to make a picture about Dillinger, but they were slammed by the press, for making a movie that glorified real-life criminals. When the heat died down, in the early forties, Warner Bro. bought the rights to a novel called High Sierra - a story loosely based on Dillinger.
After being released from prison, notorious thief Roy Earle (Humphrey Bogart) is hired by his old boss to help a group of inexperienced criminals plan and carry out the robbery of a California resort.
High Sierra is a wild mix of gangster, film-noir, melodrama, and western. It is Bogart's first main role after a decade of being supporting actor in films like The Roaring Twenties (1939). It is a movie about the loss of - and desire for- more innocent times. It is also about men nostalgic for a time where outlaws were treated as kings.
Raoul Walsh's direction gives the film a gritty atmosphere filled with tension. The cinematography gives us a sense of dread and impending doom. The film is well paced & the score, by Adolph Deutsch, adds to the emotional weight of important scenes.
I had a mixed response to High Sierra. It felt more dated than other Bogart films made at the time, like Maltese Falcon (1941) & Casablanca (1942). A romantic subplot comes across as predatory in present time. I also thought some of the characters' actions didn't make much practical sense. It was easy to like, hard to love.
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