US 100m Dir: Raoul Walsh Key Cast: Humphrey Bogart
I love a film with a good dog role and Pard here is excellent, and played brilliantly by Humphrey Bogart's own dog Zero.
Career criminal Roy Earle (Humphrey Bogart) is pardoned and released from jail only to find that it's only because he's been contracted for a robbery in the Sierra Nevada mountains. As he waits for the nod to do the job he attempts to marry young woman Velma, even paying for an operation on her club foot, but is rejected and finds becoming closer to fellow outsider in the gang Ida (Marie Garson).
<i>High Sierra</i> feels like a very clear middle ground between the gangster films of the 1930s and the murky film noirs of the 1940s. Earle is a complicated character and as a viewer it's often difficult to know where you stand with him. He's an outsider, older and more moral than the men he has to work with but despite mostly showing himself to be a good guy he will calmly shoot someone if needed. His desire to be with normal girl Velma never feels plausible, he's stuck in this life and there's no escape.
This is the film which really made the name of Humphrey Bogart and it's easy to see why. His performance is subtler than in some of his more famous roles but it carefully tows the line between being a likeable good guy to a genuinely unsettling villain. Previous gangster films had shown some sympathy towards the main character, usually by suggesting it wasn't really their fault they'd fallen into this life of crime, but High Sierra never does that, making Earle and murky and conflicting character.
The climax of this film is spectacular with a fantastic car chase and Earle hiding from the police on the side of a mountain, all shot on location. It's frantic as Earle continually gets closer and closer to being apprehended and is forced to take ever more drastic action to avoid it. It's pretty clear that he's not going to escape, especially as at the time it would be unthinkable to have a villain get away.
Some of it's pacing doesn't quite work but this is a fascinating film as it redefined what a crime movie could be and gave Bogart his first starring role.
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