Lauren Bacall is 19 and making her debut. Knowing nothing about cinema, she arrives on the set trembling with stage fright. Intimidated, she creates a distant mermaid look to camouflage her apprehension. The only way to behave in front of Humphrey Bogart is to lower your head and look at him from below, she thinks. Bogart, of course, cracks instantly. The director, Howard Hawks, modeled Bacall on his idea: a slender woman, whose name is Lauren (when in reality, her name is Betty Joan), with a serious tone (he had her read and re-read it at classical texts aloud). Behind the scenes, she is asked to scream, to break her voice. The most famous quote from the film, “If you need anything, whistle”with its erotic overtones, is not in the script (censorship is watching), but was suggested by Hawks to screenwriter Jules Furthman right from rehearsals.
Anthology fights
Considering himself the protector of the actress, the filmmaker sees with displeasure that between Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, over the days, something happens (and how!). Bogart, moreover, is entitled to shouting matches of anthology on the part of his then wife, Mayo Methot. Shot in chronological order, as William Faulkner rewrites dialogue from day to day, the film enjoys easy shooting, slowed down at the end when the US State Department realizes Hemingway’s book is set in Cuba (so that the Batista regime, friend, lends itself to trafficking). Hawks then decides to locate everything in Martinique.
Other details: Hoagy Carmichael, the pianist, appears in the cinema for the first time (and will have a magnificent career) and Marcel Dalio, who plays Frenchy, does not know, then, that his parents, Romanian Jews, are exterminated by the Nazis. Considered today as a classic, “The Port of Anguish” will have two remakes (much less good): “High Seas Traffic” (1950, with John Garfield and Patricia Neal), and “Arms Traffickers in Cuba (1958, with Audie Murphy and Patricia Owens).
Thursday May 4 at 8:50 p.m. on TCM Cinéma. American detective film by Howard Hawks (1944). With Lauren Bacall, Humphrey Bogart. 1h40. (Multicast and On Demand).
