Release Date: June 13, 1942
Running Time: 82 minutes
Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Irene Manning, Richard Travis
Directed By: Lewis Seiler
After High Sierra hit the screen but before Humphrey Bogart was to take on his most iconic role as Rick Blaine in Casablanca, Bogart made one final gangster film for Warner Brothers. It is a perfectly acceptable film for what it is but fails to be anything more than that. High Sierra feels more like the end of an era for Bogart than this and thus The Big Shot comes across more like an encore that ends a show on a less than stellar note. Fortunately, many years later, Bogart would return to the genre one last time in The Desperate Hours, his second to last film, to show he could play criminals better than most. Here, though, there is nothing too exceptional about his character or the story.
Duke (Bogart) is a gangster who was once a Big Shot. He has spent time in prison thrice and another conviction would be a life sentence. He has a history with Lorna Fleming Irene Manning) , wife to Martin Fleming (Stanley Ridges), a crooked attorney who wants to hire Duke for an armored car robbery. When Lorna shows up at Duke’s apartment the night of the planned robbery, Duke skips out on the heist which goes south leaving people dead on both sides. An eye witness is badgered by the police into claiming Duke was there when he wasn’t. Duke turns on Martin, threatening to expose his part in the heist if an alibi isn’t manufactured for him. Martin agrees but changes his mind when he finds out Duke was with Lorna that night.
The man supplying Duke with an alibi is proved to be lying in court and the two go to jail, Duke for life and his alibi, George (Richard Travis), for a year for perjury. Eventually, Duke escapes prison but George, who attempted to stop Duke from escaping, is accused of being an accessory that ended up with one of the guards killed. George is now being threatened with a murder charge and a much lengthier prison sentence.
This film is pretty rote and unoriginal. That isn’t to say there is nothing here of interest. The heist scene involving several gunmen and the armored car is staged well and the stunt work is first rate and shockingly violent at times. This, however, is at odds with the portrayal of the police throughout the remainder of the film. They are shown as incompetent and inattentive, failing to even notice when Duke strolls into the police station to turn himself in once he establishes his alibi. They are also shown to be determined to pin the crime on someone without any evidence at all, more interested in getting Duke than proving he was even there in the first place. This causes us to struggle having someone to root for as we also cannot get behind Duke.
Fortunately there is George who shows up in time to give us a truly good character to stand behind. George is a man who is in need of some quick money so he can marry his sweetheart even though her family doesn’t approve. When he is sent to prison he tries to befriend Duke but gets nowhere with the man. We like his character enough so that when he is wrongfully accused of colluding with Duke and an accessory to murder we want Duke to do the right thing and exonerate the man.
The finale of the film is well staged but struggles with the limitations of a low budget film from this era. There is a chase scene in the mountains on snow covered roads that involves several cars and motorcycles. Unfortunately, well the stunts are first rate the rest of it is diminished by some obvious reuse of footage and sped up frames to give the illusion of speed. It’s still exciting to watch, and the ending is heartbreaking, but better cinematography would have really sold the illusion better.
In the end this is really an unexceptional film that could have been so much more than it ended up being. It holds the distinction of being the last gangster film Bogart would ever do for Warner Brothers and the last time he would play such a role until thirteen years later when he would star in the superb The Desperate Hours for Paramount. As a swan song it is lacking. Had it come a few years earlier it would probably be looked on with more favor but where it lands in Bogart’s oeuvre makes it feel like a lesser film than it really deserves. Still, it had potential. It just couldn’t quite make it happen.
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