The private detective, serious, unable to show any emotions, he enters the mansion of the Stern-wood and meets a sassy young girl who looks at him up and down and says: “you are Not very high. Neither looks bad, although I suppose that you already know”. It is the first scene of “The eternal sleep” (1946) and enough of those words, uttered by Martha Vickers, to accurately describe the Humphrey Bogart film. One of the legends most solid of Hollywood, and despite its many imitators, still remains unique. Although it was not always so.
THE MATERIAL OF DREAMS
The professional beginnings of Bogie were not easy. Although Humphrey DeForest Bogart (1899-1957) was born in a home wealthy of New York, his talent was not recognized until its maturity. It was his brutal characterization of the killer Duke Mantee in “The petrified forest” (1935), first on Broadway and then in Hollywood, the one that gave it to know. But would spend more time for their true personality film call the attention. And it occurred at the beginning of the Second World War.
Casablanca
by then the world was tired of laughing to the sophisticated wit of a Cary Grant or of dream to the rhythm of the skirmishes of Tyrone Power. The devastating conflagration of war had pushed the film to a view more pessimistic view of the society and the black cinema imposed itself as the consciousness of a broken world morally. The bad guys of the past such as James Cagney or Edward G. Robinson, they looked more like beasts at the mercy of their own appetites, but without the nuances of human. the Bogart was the best representative of the type disenchanted and hopeless, with a personal code of ethics and able to resort to brute force if it was necessary.
In an industry where the success is mainly due to the physical attraction, the consecration of Bogart nearly 50 years, urged his biographers and historians of film to try to explain your case. “The basis of the attraction that exerts the personality of Bogart lies in its obstinate refusal to accept to anyone, except in the terms marked by him, or to auction its integrity,” writes Terence Pettigrew, a comprehensive study of his career. “Cynics and idealists had moved to drifting in a hostile world before they appear Bogart, but your style, which represents the total absence of style, was definitive in regards to this particular characterization. No one who came after him could expect to overcome the comparison, or even stay at a certain distance, because they were not the qualities of the character that made him unique, but the rubber in which these are expressed. And this, we think we can say with justice, will n ever be surpassed”.
One of the features of Bogart on the screen was his lack of interest in everything that was happening around him and that showed with a face expressionless. “This reflected in part the touch emotional of a man who is repelled by the sentimentality,” said the writer and critic of british theatre, Kenneth Tynan– “and, in part, also, the security of a professional actor who knew freaking well that I could do without him.” So what we saw in “The last refuge” (1941), “The maltese falcon” (1941) and “to Have and have not” (1946), creating a mystique around them and leading a new generation of rough, capable of displacing the older men of more obvious attractions. From then on imposed on the names of Richard Widmark, Robert Ryan, and, above all, Robert Mitchum. All, rogue hardcore played anti-heroes whose actions were situated on the border of good and evil. Then they would have to reign the bad boys on the Ac tors Studio with Marlon Brando to the head. This time incorporating his characters psychological elements most exalted, increasingly moving away from the tortured soul of the common man exposed to the evils of his time.
later, the spirit of Bogart will be taken up by another generation, although with his own style. There we have the great Gene Hackman in “Contact in France” (1971), a character very much in the line of what I would have done Bogie. However, there are few who remain intact within that style. Perhaps at individual roles but not as a personality, in every sense of the word. When Jeff Bridges played the starring role of “The Big Lewoski” (1998), almost a parody of “The eternal sleep”, he did so assuming the temperament and appearance of a researcher mediocre and without aspiration of the end of the century. Maybe that would have been the end of Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe Bogart played in the 40′s. But it is a speculation, nothing more. The human types have changed as much as the same film and since it is not possible to find a direct heir, and with so much style.
Jacqueline Dalya
THE LOVER FATIGUED
Although Humphrey Bogart starred in one of the romantic movies most famous of all time, his image is hardly that of a man who lives by and for love. As in “Casablanca” (1942), for him there are other things more important, and waiver of Ingrid Bergman on a for-cause altruistic. In his private life, Bogie was not different, although considerably less heroic. Of his four wives only remembers Lauren Bacall, his coestrella in some of your tapes most famous and the woman that accompanied him until his last breath, suffering from horrendous suffering by the abuse of tobacco and alcohol. In her autobiography, Bacall recalls his first encounter with Bogart: “there was No thunder or lightning”. However, while they worked in “to Have and have not”, their first film together, would feel something more for him. Recalls the actress: “I don’t know how it happened, it was almost imperceptible. We had three weeks wi th the movie, it was the end of the day… Bogie came in to say goodbye. He stood behind me as always and joking around as usual; when suddenly he bent down, put his hand under my chin and kissed me. It was an impulse, he was rather shy, and not the calculated jump of the wolf”.
In the film was measured best with actresses as independent as himself. Mary Astor, Ida Lupine and Katharine Hepburn gave the replica ideal. But none like the own Bacall. And it is in the last scene of “The eternal sleep” which establish the rules of play inside and outside of the screen. After nearly two hours of emotions, and blackmail crimes, we do not yet know if the couple remain together. Then, Bogart the looks at him and says with insolence: “What’s going on with you?” Bacall answered with aplomb: “Nothing you can’t fix.” The movie has finished.
No comments:
Post a Comment