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Gabrielle (Bettie Davis) works at her Gramp's (Charley Grapewin)
gasstation/roadhouse in the middle of nowhere, the desert, USA, and her
prospects for the future are pretty slim: Creative at heart, the only
person her age around is Boze (Dick Foran), and employee of the gasstation
who desperately wants to get into her pants but who has no understanding
or in fact patience for her artistic side and who doesn't even pretend to
show interest in the poetry she's reading ...
Then a vagabond, Alan Squire (Leslie Howard) stops by, an author, an
intellectual and a poet at heart, and in the short time he spends with
her, Alan opens Gabrielle's mind to a whole set of new ideas - so much so
that Gabrielle, who has obviously fallen in love with him, wants to
persuade him to remain with her or to take her with him ... very much to
the dismay of Boze of course. Alan however considers himself a free spirit
and declines Gabrielle's suggestions. Disappointed, Gabrielle still
hitches Alan a ride with the Chisolms (Genevieve Tobin, Paul Harvey) ...
but their ride soon enough gets held up by notorious gangster/killer Duke
Mantee (Humphrey Bogart) and his gang (Joe Sawyer, Adrian Morris, Slim
Thompson), who are presently on the run from the police and in dire need
of a new escape vehicle - so they just require the Chisolms' car. When
Alan learns that Mantee and company head for Gabrielle's roadhouse, he
heads there himself (on foot) to warn her - but runs right into the
gangsters, who plan to put up camp at the place until their accomplices,
first and foremost Duke's girlfriend, arrive there as well and who hold
all the guests and personnel hostage for the time being.
Boze, who is more brawns than brains, is the first one to do something
stupid as he tries to overcome the gangsters single-handedly - and as a
result he is shot in the arm and has to be treated by Gabrielle. With
Gabrielle and Boze out of the room, intellectual Alan finally realizes he
is indeed in love with her - and goes on to analyze the situation:
Pennyless, he can never afford her the life she longs for (she wants to go
to France), but he has a life insurance worth 5000 Dollars, which he signs
over to her (without her knowing it of course), then persuades Duke
Mantee, who has the reputation of a ruthless killer anyway, to kill him in
the course of the proceedings. Mantee agrees, but appears to be far less
ruthless than he's supposed to be, and despite his tough talk one can feel
he has second thoughts.
Eventually, the law catches up with the Mantee gang, and it all amounts
to a giant shootout - during which Gabrielle and Alan finally confess
their love to each other. Then Mantee sees an opportunity to escape
through the backdoor, and suddenly Alan realizes Duke is not going to make
true his promise and kill him ... even when he begs him to, actually. So
Alan forcefully prevents Mantee from making good his escape, in a way that
leaves Mantee no other option to shoot him dead - and to his joy, Alan
dies in the arms of his love Gabrielle.
(Mantee is caught soon thereafter offscreen, but that has hardly any
influence on the plot anymore.)
In the early 1930's, a young actor called Humphrey Bogart came to
Hollywood, played unimpressive supporting roles in a handful of
unimpressive films, and ultimately returned to the New York theatre stage
(where he came from) again, where he played the role of gangster Duke
Mantee (a character based on real-life gangster John Dillinger) in the
smashhit play The Petrified Forest by Robert E.Sherwood opposite
Leslie Howard, then a big movie star. When Warner Brothers decided
to adapt teh play for the big screen in 1936, they hired Howard to repeat
his role - but wanted an established gangster actor like Edward G.Robinson
or James Cagney to play Mantee. Leslie howard though had enough star power
to be able to insist on Bogart to be his partner in the movie version as
well - and when you see their onscreen interaction, you clearly see why:
seeing intellectual but unworldly Howard and violent but down-to-earth
Bogart in an extended battle of wits is a sight to behold, especially when
Bogart does things like scolding Howard for not repecting Gramp without
abandoning his character, or shows sudden scruples before killing Howard.
Add to this an equally great performance by a young Bette Davis and a
subtle, atmospheric, claustrophobic cirectorial job and you have got one
great film. Sure, the film never manages to deny its stageplay-roots, but
in this case, this simply doesn't matter.
Oh, and in case you didn't know, this film really launched Bogart's
Hollywood career, even if for the next few years he was limited almost
exclusively to gangster roles.
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