Dark Passage (1947) – DVD

**½/**** Image A- Sound A- Extras B-
starring Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Bruce Bennett, Agnes Moorehead
screenplay by Delmer Daves, based on the novel by David Goodis
directed by Delmer Daves

by Travis Mackenzie Hoover Dark Passage not only begins but also keeps going with the tricky technique of subjective camera. Vincent Parry, you see, is an escaped convict framed for the murder of his wife; he's also about to get plastic surgery, which necessitates obscuring the fact that he's played by Humphrey Bogart until the bandages come off. There were surely better ways to make the concealment of Vincent's face some kind of metaphor, or at least give it a measure of aesthetic unity, but writer-director Delmer Daves merely sees that he has to hide Bogie's visage and throws on subjectivity as a catchall. Thing is, he's very slick (as in spit-shine clean) about how he does it, so it doesn't really hurt too much; you're dissatisfied because he didn't dig deeper. And that pretty much sums up the Dark Passage experience.

As Andrew Sarris once noted, "Delmer Daves is the property of those who can enjoy stylistic conviction in an intellectual vacuum." I'm not sure he's a "vacuum," but clearly what filled the space between his ears was not being used regularly. Otherwise, he wouldn't have given such a nonchalant gloss to a film where a) a man (Bogart/Parry) escapes prison, b) is picked up by one Irene Jansen (Lauren Bacall), whom he doesn't know, c) gets the aforementioned plastic surgery to cover up his true identity, and d) finds his best friend dead. Mostly these are elements of foreboding, if not screaming panic, but Daves's camera just glides on–when, that is, it's not fumbling for important items in the frame as our hero turns his head. Daves also manages to do nothing with the credulity-straining coincidence of Irene knowing Madge Rapf (Agnes Moorehead), Parry's ex-fling and a key witness for the prosecution.

You could argue that what's important here is classic noir paranoia, and that glaring coincidences (there are more to come) are entirely beside the point. But, save for scattered bits of chiaroscuro, Daves is doggedly realistic–meaning we can't accept it all as genre dreamscape. Worse, his ear for dialogue is not exactly that of a poet ("That has nothing to do with it!" "And Santa Claus has nothing to do with Christmas!"), meaning his straight-up direction fails to account for the occasional risibility of his screenwriting. Although one feels for the cinematic conundrum of casting one actor for a part that calls for two faces, one doesn't sense that anyone's thinking beyond the mechanical. This despite that David Goodis's source novel would seem to be feeding the filmmakers tawdry gimmes: a loser trumpet-player in a flea pit; a hugely crooked plastic surgeon; and a great scene with a cop in a luncheonette that would've had juice with pretty much anyone else at the helm.

This is not to say that Dark Passage is inept. It's hugely competent and airtight in its craft: not ugly, not cheap, and not at all unendurable, but rather good enough to make you want a little more. It's the kind of classy filler that's a little too classy for its own good–certainly too classy for the material, which ought to go in the scuzzy direction in which noir itself was headed by 1947. The film can't even manage sparks with the headlining pairing of Bogie and Bacall, since the central conceit keeps them mostly offscreen from each other; the fireworks we crave are in pretty meagre portions. Dark Passage is immanently watchable, yet its lack of scrutiny dooms it to second-tier status. It's hard-sheen forgettable, nice to look at but without a good idea in its pretty little head.

THE DVD
Repackaging their 2003 snapper DVD of Dark Passage in a keepcase, Warner does its usual damnedest in the transfer department. The full-frame image is predictably crisp, with perhaps a hair less fine detail than a fresh run through the telecine could yield. The Dolby 1.0 mono sound is sharp and well-articulated. Extras include "Hold Your Breath and Cross Your Fingers: The Story of Dark Passage" (10 mins.), a too-short retrospective making-of that eventually drifts into the HUAC hearings as a possible reason for the film's box-office failure; Leonard Maltin and Eric Lax are on hand to offer soundbites, but the ridiculously hyperbolic narration of the piece gets to be a little much. On a higher note, Slick Hare (7 mins.) is a Friz Freling Bugs Bunny short in which Bogart himself demands rabbit from maître d' Elmer Fudd; its best joke involves Ray Milland in Lost Weekend mode. Also included: the trailer for Dark Passage. Available individually or as part of the four-title "Bogie & Bacall: The Signature Collection".

106 minutes; NR; 1.33:1; English DD 1.0; CC; English, French, Spanish subtitles; DVD-9; Region One; Warner