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Forgot to blog about watching Dark Passage a few weeks back. Sovay wrote about it in 2013*, and describes it well – my only additional comments are that the plot seems to run on coincidence, but that I’m not sure if this counts as a flaw or works with the dream/nightmare noir mode.
Parry (Bogart) doesn’t seem to have ever met Irene (Bacall) until she helps his prison escape, and yet she’s quite ensconced in his former social circle – she’s frenemies with Madge (Moorhead), the woman whose testimony convicted him, and kinda-sorta dating Madge’s ex – all of which would be understandable if the script ever suggested she Irene has deliberately cultivated these people in order to further investigate, or just bask in, the murder case she admits to being obsessed with; but the suggestion never comes up that I noticed. We learn Irene’s father was convicted of murdering her stepmother, but we don’t know if her belief in his innocence is correct, or who else might have done the deed. My two favourite characters, the taxi driver and his plastic surgeon buddy, get no backstory whatsoever – possibly that’s the appeal: for all the movie tells us, they could be otherworldly agents who specialize in helping the cause of justice through indirect and dodgy means.
*https://sovay.dreamwidth.org/544032.html No attempt to embed the link seems to work.
no subject
Date: 2017-12-05 07:16 pm (UTC)From:I remember it being less coincidental in the novel, although for the opposite reason—it's plausible for them to have moved in the same social circles without ever meeting, and he's already on her radar by the time of the trial because he's the man her boyfriend's ex is obsessed with; she's suspicious of his wife's murder from the start. Her part in his escape is deliberate, not happenstance.
We learn Irene’s father was convicted of murdering her stepmother, but we don’t know if her belief in his innocence is correct, or who else might have done the deed.
That's never clarified in the novel, either, although Irene's accurate judgment where Parry and Madge and the other characters are concerned suggests she was right about her father, too. (I don't remember what the options are in the movie, but in the novel her mother's death was either murder or falling down stairs and she's really sure it was the stairs.)
No attempt to embed the link seems to work.
What HTML do you use for links? I have noticed they sometimes go weird in your posts.
no subject
Date: 2017-12-05 09:32 pm (UTC)From:That makes way more sense.
I don’t recall the movie giving much detail about her stepmother’s death, just that her father was accused and convicted.
Does the novel provide any explanation for the taxi driver?
If I cut and paste an URL for any DW entry, the link goes to a 404 page – I’ve tried tweaking the address, removing the “s” from https, etc, but it doesn’t seem to help.
no subject
Date: 2017-12-06 05:07 am (UTC)From:I wonder if the filmmakers assumed audiences would simply take it for granted that Bogey and Bacall were on the same side, which makes me suddenly long for a film where they played antagonists.
Does the novel provide any explanation for the taxi driver?
Not that I recall. I think the taxi driver just happens.
If I cut and paste an URL for any DW entry, the link goes to a 404 page – I’ve tried tweaking the address, removing the “s” from https, etc, but it doesn’t seem to help.
Huh. I am afraid I have no suggestions—I always use the standard (spaced out so as not to turn into an actual link) < a href = " [url] " > [text] < / a > and it's worked fine with me for Dreamwidth links. I don't know what makes the difference.