Bogart & Bacall: The Complete Collection

Humphrey Bogart was a 45-year-old acting veteran only a few years into leading-man stardom and Lauren Bacall a 19-year-old model with no acting experience when Howard Hawks paired them in To Have and Have Not (1944), loosely adapted from Ernest Hemingway's novel from a script co-written by William Faulkner. The story is set during World War II, as Bogart's cynical fishing boat captain reluctantly helps out the French Resistance and falls in love with Bacall's smoky singer. Hawks directs masterfully, bringing a conventional tale to life with beautifully crafted scenes and colorful dialogue that has the quality of lyrics. Bogart and Bacall fell in love during the production and appeared together in three more films. Bogart plays Philip Marlowe in The Big Sleep (1946), Hawks’s adaptation of Raymond Chandler's classic detective novel. It's a film noir masterpiece with a snappy script and witty dialogue (by Faulkner and screenwriting greats Leigh Brackett and Jules Furthman) that is rife with sexual metaphors. In Dark Passage (1947), Bogart stars as an innocent man who escapes from death row with the help of Bacall. The plot is a stretch but the film is compelling, with a clever visual twist (we see the escape almost entirely through Bogart's eyes) and excellent use of San Francisco locations. Key Largo (1948) is a tropical film noir set almost entirely in the confines of a rundown hotel in the Florida Keys, where an exiled gangster (Edward G. Robinson) takes war veteran Bogart and young widow Bacall hostage as a hurricane hits. Directed by John Huston, it earned costar Claire Trevor an Oscar for her poignant turn. All four are American classics and showcase one of the great screen teams of American cinema. Previously all available in separate editions, extras on this set—spread across the discs—include behind-the-scenes featurettes, vintage cartoons, and a radio adaptation of To Have and Have Not. Highly recommended, for those who don’t already own the titles individually. (S. Axmaker)