The Maltese Falcon

Even though the Warner Bros. executives were happy with John Huston's draft of the screenplay, they put restrictions on the first-time director's production by allotting him only six weeks to shoot the film with a $300,000 budget. If Huston happened to go over budget, Warner Bros. warned him that he would be looking for a job elsewhere. But Huston left nothing to chance. He tailored the screenplay to include shot-by-shot instructions for him and his crew, detailing the set-up of each and every scene. The final screenplay was so finely laid out that one could read the script and perfectly visualize the finished film. This method was used by Huston only for The Maltese Falcon. Other directors, like Alfred Hitchcock and later Steven Spielberg, would employ this method more frequently throughout their career. Aside from sticking close to the novel and providing visual and written instructions for each scene breakdown, John Huston also defied conventional Hollywood production procedure by shooting much of The Maltese Falcon in sequence, with the exception of a few exterior shots. This method helped not only the novice director, but also gave the actors a continuity that strengthened their performances amid the densely plotted mystery. John Huston instructed Mary Astor to run around the set several times before appearing in a scene so as to give her character a nervous, out-of-breath appeal. In fact, the director worked very closely with Astor on her characterization of the amoral Brigid O'Shaughnessy. Very closely. Except for Huston's closest friends (like Hollywood director William Wyler), no one knew that Huston and Astor were having a romantic affair during filming. And speaking of William Wyler, Huston showed many of his production sketches to Wyler, who made some important suggestions that Huston eventually incorporated. But it was producer Henry Blanke who gave John Huston what he recalled as the single greatest piece of advice he would ever receive as a director: "Shoot each scene as if it was the most important scene in the film." A few of the principal actors became close friends during the shooting of The Maltese Falcon. Humphrey Bogart, Peter Lorre, Ward Bond, and Mary Astor would often join John Huston at the Lakeside Country Club for drinks, buffet supper, and good conversation, usually until midnight. Bogart always considered Lorre and Huston great pals, mostly because they met two principal criteria: they weren't boring and they could drink like fish. John Huston's father, veteran character actor Walter Huston, wanted to appear in his son's directorial debut picture for good luck. But what was intended as a sentimental gesture soon turned into a hilarious practical joke. Walter's walk-on part, as the wounded ship captain who staggers into Spade's office holding the bundled-up Maltese Falcon, was such an easy scene to shoot, that it should have required only two or three takes to successfully complete. And given John Huston's tight production schedule and budget, multiple retakes for frivolous scenes were not encouraged or even possible. Nevertheless, John Huston shot the scene over and over again, holding back his laughter when the elder Huston complained, "Didn't expect to have to put in a day's work!" John Huston came up with myriad reasons why his father would have to re-do the scene: he missed his mark, he staggered too much, he overacted, technical difficulties, and so on. By the time the scene was printed, Walter Huston left the set in a foul mood and covered in bruises sustained from falling down dead so much. However, his son wasn't finished with him just yet. The next day, the director had Mary Astor, whom the elder Huston had co-starred with in Dodsworth (1936), call his father. Pretending to be John Huston's secretary, the director had Mary say, "Mr. Huston is sorry, but something happened to the film in the lab and we'll have to retake your sequence this afternoon. Could you be ready to shoot at one o'clock?" Walter Huston vehemently replied, "You tell my son to get another actor or go to hell! He made me take twenty falls, and I'm sore all over, and I'm not about to take twenty more." John made it up to his father several years later, after directing him in an Academy Award-winning performance in Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948). Huston and company tickled themselves with a number of other on-set jokes. As Mary Astor recounted in her autobiography, the cast and crew had a system, whereby Huston would signal for a certain practical joke to be played for visitors to the set. For the benefit of visiting star-struck social clubwomen, the "No. 5" had Bogart going into a prepared act with Sydney Greenstreet. He'd start yelling and cursing at him, calling him a fat old fool. "Who the hell do you think you are? You upstaged me, and I'm telling you I'm not having any--," at which point Huston would jump into the act, holding back Bogart's mock rage. Very quickly, the embarrassed and disillusioned ladies would shuffle towards the nearest exit. Meanwhile, the "No. 10" had Peter Lorre coming out of Mary Astor's dressing room at the appropriate moment, adjusting his fly and saying, "See you later Mary." by Scott McGee

Dashiell Hammett's 1930 novel The Maltese Falcon had already been made into a movie twice before its most well known version was created in 1941 and became an American cinema classic. The Maltese Falcon (1941) was John Huston's directorial debut, and it made quite an impression on audiences and critics alike. George Raft, a Warner Bros. contract player, was the studio's first choice to play detective Sam Spade, but he turned down the opportunity because he felt that it was not an important picture. Humphrey Bogart, who had been on suspension for refusing to appear in Bad Men of Missouri (1941), was drafted into the role instead. Geraldine Fitzgerald was first choice to play Brigid, the role that ended up being immortalized by Mary Astor. John Huston cast his father, Walter, in an uncredited cameo as the man who staggers into Spade's office with the infamous statue, then dies. John had some fun making his father do the scene over and over again, and that same night Mary Astor called Walter pretending to be John's secretary. She said that John would need him to re-shoot his scene because something had happened to the film in the lab. Walter screamed, "You tell my son to get another actor or go to hell!" as Mary held out the receiver for everyone to hear. Jokes such as this were commonplace on the set. The cast and crew had the feeling they were shooting something exciting and tried to deter any unwanted visitors from coming to the set. The publicity people once brought a group of priests to the set. Before shooting began, Astor looked down at her legs and said, "Hold it a minute, I've got a g**damn run in my stocking" while the publicity man quickly ushered the priests off the set. From that moment on, jokes like that became a way for the cast and crew to amuse themselves and keep unwanted people off the set at the same time. The people involved in The Maltese Falcon were so efficient that they often finished shooting for the day early and went to lunch at the nearby Lakeside Golf Club. On one of these days, Huston (who made detailed plans and sketches for each shot, much like Hitchcock later did) had set aside an entire day to shoot one elaborate moving camera sequence. The sequence lasted about seven minutes, and they nailed it perfectly in one take; the rest of the day was spent at the golf club. It was because of days like this that production finished two days ahead of schedule and $54,000 under budget.Today, many film scholars refer to The Maltese Falcon as the first official film noir. To Huston's credit, he did not change one line of dialogue, and he only dropped one short scene when he realized he could substitute a phone call instead. Bogart's role in this film elevated him to cult status, and Ingrid Bergman studied him as Sam Spade to judge how to interact with him in Casablanca two years later. Mary Astor would hyperventilate before shooting for her scenes began in order to achieve that breathless quality she retained throughout the film, the look of a liar. Peter Lorre, as usual, turned in an excellent performance as Joel Cairo. And Sydney Greenstreet earned a Best Supporting Actor nomination for his first ever film role, as Casper Gutman. Greenstreet was extremely nervous just before shooting his first scene. "Mary dear, hold my hand, tell me I won't make an ass of meself!" he begged Astor before he began his long monologue telling the history of the statue. Obviously, his fears were unfounded and the entire cast was perfection; critical acclaim and Oscar nominations followed - Best Picture, Best Screenplay, and Greenstreet's nomination solidified the opinion that the film was indeed a great one. To this day, it is considered one of the quintessential detective thrillers and has attracted a loyal cult following. Director: John Huston Producer: Hal B. Wallis Screenplay: John Huston, based on the novel by Dashiell Hammett Cinematography: Arthur Edeson Editing: Thomas Richards Art Direction: Robert Haas Music: Adolph Deutsch Cast: Humphrey Bogart (Sam Spade), Mary Astor (Brigid O'Shaughnessy), Peter Lorre (Joel Cairo), Sydney Greenstreet (Casper Gutman), Barton MacLane (Detective Lieutenant Dundy) BW-101m. Closed captioning. Descriptive Video. by Sarah Heiman

It's been regarded as the definitive American detective movie, the harbinger of the film noir movement, and the most significant Hollywood directing debut short of Citizen Kane. Writer/director John Huston's screen adaptation of Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon (1941) has held endless fascination for generations of movie fans, and has cried out for a worthy treatment for home viewing since the birth of the DVD market. Warner Home Video finally rose to the occasion with their recent release of The Maltese Falcon: Special Edition, a three-disc set that even the most demanding fan will find, once unwrapped, to deliver the goods. The scenario's familiar ground to even the most casual of cinema buffs, so we'll keep the recap brief. San Francisco private detective Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogart) receives what appears to be a routine job of providing bodyguard services to an attractive brunette (Mary Astor) answering to "Miss Wonderley." She's ostensibly come to the Bay Area to free her sister from the influence of a disreputable type named Floyd Thursby. Spade's partner Miles Archer (Jerome Cowan) happily takes charge of the elegant new client; he isn't on the job long before he's gunned down by an unseen assailant. The local cops find Thursby dead soon afterward; Spade's situation is made even that much more tenuous by the fact that he had been carrying on a clandestine affair with Miles' pathetically clinging wife Iva (Gladys George). "Miss Wonderley" resurfaces, revealing her real name as Brigid O'Shaughnessey and begging for Spade's continued protection. Remaining in her orbit, while trying to find those responsible for the Archer and Thursby murders, brings Spade into contact with a most colorful cabal of criminals. In encountering the obese, overweening smuggling impresario Kasper Gutman (Sydney Greenstreet; the perfumed and peculiar Dr. Joel Cairo (Peter Lorre); and Gutman's questionable hired muscle, a short-fused punk named Wilmer Cook (Elisha Cook, Jr.), Spade uncovers their common goal. All have been embroiled in a global hunt to recover a legendary, centuries-old falcon statuette, enameled to conceal the solid gold and inlaid jewels beneath. These proceedings were brilliantly laid out by Huston, whose screenplay was faithful to both letter and spirit of Hammett's text, and who immediately showed an assured hand and striking visual sense behind the camera, masterfully utilizing lighting and cameras angles to create Spade's foreboding world. For Bogart, this was the role that ensured he was through playing second gunsel to Cagney or Robinson. Hardly innocent, not always admirable, but hewing to his own moral code in an immoral world, Sam Spade represents the crystallization of the Bogey screen persona, and The Maltese Falcon the crucible of his legend. The supporting performances were equally remarkable. Astor had never been better, creating a vulnerable posture that masked depths of duplicity. The 61-year-old Greenstreet made an indelible impression in his screen debut, and Lorre, whose biggest success with American audiences to this point came in Fox's Mr. Moto Bs, carved his niche as well. Mention has to be given to Lee Patrick as the eternally patient secretary Effie, and Ward Bond and Barton MacLane as the local plainclothesmen Spade's trying to keep at a distance. For this latest DVD incarnation, Warner Home Video made a new digital transfer, and the product is visually crisp and unblemished. Eric Lax, co-author of the biography Bogart, offers thoughtful and detailed insights in his feature-length commentary, showing an encyclopedic handle on more than just the central figure of the production. The Greenstreet-centered original theatrical trailer is also offered. In rounding out the extras on the set's first disc, WHV has presented them in their "Night at the Movies" format, giving the viewe the option of playing the content in an uninterrupted stream to replicate an evening in the theater circa 1941. This array includes the trailer for Sergeant York; a minute-and-a-half of newsreel footage documenting an FDR/Churchill rendezvous; Jean Negulesco's Oscar-nominated color short The Gay Parisian; and two WB animated offerings, Hiawatha's Rabbit Hunt and Meet John Doughboy. The third time, they say, is the charm, and the iconic status enjoyed by Huston's creation tends to obscure the fact that it was actually Warner Brothers' third attempt over a ten-year span to bring Hammett's story to film. It's those first two shots that fill the second disc of the set. The 1931 version of The Maltese Falcon, which for obvious reasons has often appeared under the alternate title of Dangerous Female, offers a fairly straightforward take on Hammett's prose, and actually displays a fair amount of pre-Production Code frankness in depicting Spade's bedhopping. As to Spade himself: Back in the '20s, Valentino's meteoric vogue made Hollywood so desperate for Latin leading men that they had to invent them, which is how an Austrian Jew named Jacob Krantz became Ricardo Cortez. (His kid brother Stanislaus followed suit, going on to a distinguished career as the cinematographer Stanley Cortez.) Here, the actor vested Hammett's detective with the same sort of smarmy self-satisfaction that marked the roues to which he had been commonly typed. Bebe Daniels, best known for 42nd Street and her string as Harold Lloyd's leading lady, makes a servicably conniving Brigid, and veteran character player Dudley Digges had one of his best screen moments as a wholly credible Gutman. The supporting cast is dotted with familiar faces, from the beautiful, doomed comedienne Thelma Todd as Iva Archer, to Dietrich catfight partner Una Merkel as Effie, to horror-flick icon Dwight Frye as Wilmer. Perhaps mindful of the success MGM found with its charming take on Hammett's The Thin Man (1934), Warner opted to play the Falcon plot for laughs with its 1935 remake Satan Met a Lady. Little remained of the story beyond the basic framework; Warren William inhabited the role of shiftless private eye "Ted Shayne," and the top-billed Bette Davis was his dangerous new client. The missing object of desire became a jewel-filled horn that once belonged to the Gallic hero Roland, the Cairo part went to Arthur Treacher, ever-gentlemanly while performing vandalism, and the gender-switched Gutman role was assigned to all-purpose screen dowager Alison Skipworth. Satan Met a Lady has had something of a reputation as a train wreck, and not undeservedly. The narrative's attempts at fostering a giddy, lighthearted air consistently fall flat. The script was precisely the type of assignment that Davis was famous for chafing at during her tenure at Warner, and it reflects in her mailed-in effort. While the jacket copy promises the theatrical trailers for both proto-Falcons, only the Satan preview appears. The third disc in the package contains the balance of the supplemental materials, and it's a rich selection for devotees of the film, Bogart, and Warner's output of the era. Leading off is the new documentary The Maltese Falcon: One Magnificent Bird, an effective half-hour presentation laden with background materials and observations from afficionados of the film ranging from Peter Bogdanovich to Henry Rollins to Frank Miller. If there's any quibble to be had with it, it seems that Huston, out of all the principals, got something of short shrift in terms of analyzing his contribution to the effort. Next included is a 1997 entry from TCM's Becoming Attractions series. In this 45-minute program, host Robert Osborne utilizes a baker's dozen of trailers spanning The Petrified Forest (1936) to The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) to examine how the Warner publicity machine's handling of Bogart evolved. Next is Warner's 13-minute house blooper reel from its 1940 output, Breakdowns of 1941. It offers a fun mix of Bogart, Davis, Cagney, Robinson, Stewart, Cooper, Garfield, O'Brien and many other stars and familiar character players caught blowing their lines, trashing props, and verbally expressing their frustrations in ways that wouldn't have gotten past the Hays Office. There's a little over a minute of silent makeup test footage with Astor, interesting as an archival tidbit and in watching her break character. Completing the disc are three full radio broadcast adaptations of the tale. One entry from 1946 reunited Bogart, Astor and Greenstreet; one from the fall of '43 added Lorre to that prior mix; and a 1942 presentation featured Eddie G. as Spade, Gail Patrick as Miss O'Shaughnessey and Laird Cregar as the Fat Man. For more information about the 3-disc edition of The Maltese Falcon, visit Warner Video. To order The Maltese Falcon, go to TCM Shopping. by Jay S. Steinberg