The last time I watched a Humphrey Bogart movie was seven months ago, and to be truthfully honest I never thought about in fact there been a lot of other movies I wanted to watch so really it's always been a habit of just when you can't find the right movie to recommend or celebrate a movies long anniversary of when it came out well, you always go to your default and recommend a classic movie from pre-World War. For which leads to a classic Bogart movie, that I suddenly realized is 80 years old, To Have and Have Not is not just a regular Bogart movie but also a movie which starts his love interest and later future wife Lauren Bacall and really if you had to pick one of the all-time greatest on screen couples in movie history, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall would most certainly be on that number one spot.
In Vichy France, fishing boat captain Harry (Humphrey Bogart) avoids getting involved in politics, refusing to smuggle French Resistance fighters into Martinique. But when a Resistance client is shot before, he can pay, Harry agrees to help hotel owner Gerald (Marcel Dailo) smuggle two fighters to the island.
The film itself is loosely based on Ernest Hemingway's book title of the same name, and ironically enough Hemingway and legendary director Howard Hawks were close friends and on a fishing trip, Hawks told Hemingway, who was reluctant to go into screenwriting, that he could make a great movie from his worst book, which Hawks admitted was To Have and Have Not. Hemingway and Hawks worked on the screenplay during the remainder of their fishing trip because let’s face it you can't do two things at the same time one of them which leads to boredom, the two men decided the film would not resemble the novel, but rather would tell the story of how Harry Morgan met Marie, Lauren Bacall's character moreover was extensively altered for the film. Strangely when watching the film, you do get some resemblance with the film Casablanca and Hawks himself intended to have the screenplay be loosely modeled on Casablanca, which also stared Bogie hoping for the same success Casablanca had met at the box office. And in all honesty that doesn't bother me much mainly because Bogart does a perfect job playing an anti-hero always keeping a low profile never wanting to get involved with politics mainly a survivor like every regular man going through in life even during the war. Furthermore when authorities take Bogart's cash from him he knew that he has to take the job and through the course of the movie you see the character of Morgan changing and becomes a unlikely hero by the end of the movie and even Hawks created that difference from the book to the movie because he did not like stories about "losers" for which really I would most certainly agree with him on that. So, again Bogart is defiantly the perfect choice to play that part and lets it bloom through the course of the movie and really when it comes to those kinds of movies from a crime mystery or a war drama and even a survivalist story, I would watch Bogart in all those roles because he's just a perfect actor for that role. To Have and Have Not was even a first to where Bogart would me his future wife Lauren Bacall whom this would be her first movie as an actress in fact Hawks wife urged him to invite Bacall to take a screen test after seeing her model cover on the Bazaar fashion magazine, and Bacall was only 20 years old at the time for which her and Bogie would later marry in February of 1945 just a couple of months after the film’s release. Now both of these two makes this film worth seeing for many reasons there chemistry together is just pure joy like you've met you soulmate and that's what both Bogart and Bacall represent as these two survivalists who are not afraid of anything and begins to fall for one another, moreover you watch this film and you'd believe love is still real to which Bacall and Bogie were still married until Bogie's death in 1957. To Have and Have Not is most certainly on my list of a hundred greatest films of all time, it has everything from great character development great love story as well as a great story of one man being a hero in the end and for a movie that's 80 years old this film still to this day still ages like fine wine and even to this day I'll never get tired of watch the film from beginning to end. Though the funny and sad thing about this film is that it marks ten years now since Lauren Bacall died in 2014 which really, I believe that those two are now reunited and can live together in harmony in heaven. If this great gem ever lands on Turner Classic Movies or Hulu or even Max, I will highly recommend watching the film that brought the greatest on-screen couple in movie history.
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