Rating: 
Summary: Wonderful!!
Review: Bogey and Bacall light up the screen in the first movie that they starred in together. You can see them fall in love with each other, right on the screen. If you liked "Casablanca," you will love "to Have and Have not."
Rating: 
Summary: Works because of Bogie and Bacall's chemistry.
Review: In my opinion, this movie's story is not all that interesting or original. As it's been said many times, To Have and Have Not is essentially Casablanca's twin sister, and bares almost no resemblance to the Ernest Hemingway novella. But despite it all, I must say that I prefer this movie as opposed to the other.What makes this movie so good are three things: the writing, the acting, and the real-life chemistry between the supercouple of the time, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. The screenplay has perhaps some of the most clever and memorable one-liners in movie history. In fact, this is the movie that produced the now-cliche saying "You do know how to whistle, don't you...just put your lips together, and blow," as well as the lesser-known but sure-to-bring-chills "It's even better when you help," sdaid after Bacall kisses Bogart. The acting is extremely good, especially since both the leads can be very cold and distant one moment, and very warm and sweet the next. Finally, as this movie will always be remembered for, Bogart and Bacall are clearly falling in love as the story is going, a case of art imitating life. The sexual tension in the beginning can be cut with a knife, while the true love in the middle and end is nothing short of romantic and touching. To Have and Have Not is a quintissential example of the stars making a subpar story into one of the most romantic films of the era. This is the perfect start in exploring the world of Bogart and Bacall, and perhaps the best of their four films.
Rating:
Summary: An H & H production
Review: The success of this picture was apparently a little embarassing to the legendary director Howard Hawks. He and author Ernest Hemingway cooked it up during a hunting trip, according to Hawks, in trying to make a picture out of the author's novel. They ended up with a story that ends where the novel begins, and a title that has no bearing at all on the movie. Hawks refused to admit the two of them had been influenced by "Casablanca," but that's baloney, the parallels are just too strong. Nevertheless it's a fine picture, like a variation on an earlier theme of music. Bogart and Bacall have their famous meeting, some Vichy French types on Martinique take the gaff, and what is there to say about Walter Brennan, the greatest character actor in American movies? Just another day's incredible work. The real novel was later converted into "The Breaking Point" with John Garfield.
Rating:
Summary: HEMMINGWAY'S SAGA HITS THE BIG TIME!
Review: "To Have And Have Not" is the film credited with launching Lauren Bacall's movie career. Under a personal and exclusive contract to director, Howard Hawks - who evidently hoped for a more personal involvement with his young find - Bacall disappointed her mentor by falling for, and eventually marrying, Bogart instead. In the film she plays Marie 'Slim' Browning, a pickpocket and girl about town who crosses paths with Harry Steve Morgan (Humphrey Bogart). He's a sea captain in Martinique who is double crossed by his most frequent fishing patron, Johnson (Walter Sande). However, before Steve can collect on their debt, Johnson is accidentally killed by a stray bullet. But a financial reprieve comes by way of nightclub owner and supporter of the resistance, Frenchy (Marcel Dalio). If Steve can water taxi Frenchy's freedom-fighting friends to safety his pay off will be substantial. Like most of Warner's adventure films of the period, its not the story, so much as the atmosphere that makes up the sum of this film - though in this instance - no less than literary giant, Ernest Hemmingway, was responsible for the framework on which the film's plot is based. Again, Warner outdoes the competition when it comes to remastering their catalogue of great films for the DVD consumer. The gray scale is outstanding and fine detail is rendered with remarkable clarity. Blacks - for the most part - are black. The stock footage - used during the fishing trip sequence - is obvious, riddled with excessive grain and slightly out of focus rear projection. However, that's to be expected. The rest, as they say, is the stuff that dreams are made of! The audio is MONO but cleaned up and very well balanced.
Warner gives us a featurette that, although short, covers a lot of ground regarding the film's production. There's also a Warner Brothers cartoon and the film's original theatrical trailer.
Rating:
Summary: A Thoroughly Enjoyable Favorite
Review: This movie just blew me away the first time (of several) that I saw it. It has the compelling melodrama, themes, acting, and black and white cinematography of "Casablanca" (to which it is frequently compared), but a more intense love story (although not as poignant), and a supporting cast that is almost its equal. As most people know, the movie is very loosely based on Hemingway's book. (I agree with Hemingway, it's not very good. The book does get into issues of class and imperialism, as implied by its title, but the story just doesn't hold together well.)
The movie has several other parallels to Casablanca: The male bonding of Bogie (playing charter boat captain Harry Morgan) and Walter Brennan ("Eddie"), the "rummy" who takes a liking to Bacall's character after she zings right back at one of his word puzzles (just as Bacall's tough, streetwise character is more than a match for Bogart's cynicism and his "I don't stick my neck out for no one stance," as well as for the sexual competition of beautiful Helene de Bursac--played by Dolores Moran). Bogart does his signature "I'm going out of control here, there's no telling what I might do!," fake pose to freak out the Vichy authorities (played well--considering the dialogue they're given--by a sleek Sheldon Leonard and Walter Sande as "Johnson"). Hoagy Carmichael's turn as "Cricket," the saloon pianist, is excellent, he evinces considerable style and panache. He performs two memorable numbers; Bacall sings a sultry, teasing, "How Little We Know." (A film "secret"--completely false--is that a young Andy Williams dubbed Bacall's singing.)
The French freedom fighter ("De Bursac") that Harry Morgan sneaks into Martinique does not have any of the presence or credibility that Paul Henreid ("Victor Laszlo") shows in "Casablanca." Even Henreid seems initially out of place in the latter film, but at least he has the famous "Marseillaises" bar scene and the admiring eyes of Ingrid Bergman to cement his status as inspirational hero. De Bursac's heroics are signaled only by his wounds from the bungled entry into Martinique, and by the lengths to which Bogart et al. go to secure him.
Production values also seem a bit on the cheap in this movie. For one thing, there aren't many settings. However, the bar and Harry's upstairs retreat, visited memorably by Bacall, are done very well. More importantly, the ending is not as ambiguous and complex as in Casablanca. For that reason, this is ultimately not as great a movie as Casablanca, which has more inner conflict and a kind of thematic unity to it. Still, the film is incredibly satisfying, the relationships among Bogart, Bacall, and Brennan vivid and humorous, and the romance has considerably more heat.
CAST
Humphrey Bogart - Harry Morgan
Walter Brennan - Eddie
Lauren Bacall - Marie Browning (Slim)
Dolores Moran - Helene De Bursac
Hoagy Carmichael - Cricket
Dan Seymour - Capt. M. Renard
Walter Molnar - Paul de Bursac
Marcel Dalio - Gerard (Frenchy)
Sheldon Leonard - Lieutenant Coyo
Walter Sande - Johnson
Aldo Nadi - Bodyguard
Paul Marion - Beauclerc
Patricia Shay - Mrs. Beauclerc
Pat West - Bartender
Sir Lancelot - Horatio
Ronnie Rondell - Naval Ensign
Roger Valmy
George Suzanne
Kanza Omar
Oscar Loraine - Bartender
Harold Garrison - Black Urchin
Frank Johnson
Crane Whitley - DeGaullists
Marguerite Sylva - Cashier
George Sorel - French Officer
Emmett E. Smith - Emil, the Bartender
Pedro Regas - Civilian
Chef Joseph Milani - Chef
Louis Mercier - Gaulist
Maurice Marsac - Gaulist
Suzette Harbin
Elzie Emanuel - Child
Marcel dela Brosse - Sailor
Jean de Briac - Gendarme
Adrienne D'Ambricourt - Cashier
Jack Chefe - Guide
Eugene Borden - Quartermaster
Rating:
Summary: Bogart and Bacall: A Great Combination...Plus a Great Song
Review: This is a movie I like a lot. Bogart owns a ship operating out of Vichy-controlled Martinique. He prefers neutraity but finally agrees to help a wounded anti-Fascism fighter. Walter Brennan is his slightly addled and alcoholic sidekick. Bacall is a down-on-her-luck singer in a nightclub.
Bogart is good natured but tough, and he and Bacall, in their first movie together, work up a real head of steam. The song "How Little We Know" is sung by Bacall and also serves as the exit music at the end. In my opinion, it's one of the great songs written for the movies, and it's too bad it didn't go anywhere when the movie was released. The song is largely forgotten now. Hoagy Carmichael did the music and Johnny Mercer the lyrics.
The one weakness was the casting of Dan Seymore as the chubby bad guy. He never seemed to be a credible threat. His acting is obvious and his French accent is awful.
One of the highlights is Walter Brennan. If anyone remembers him now it's as the old coot with no teeth that he played on television and in his last movies. But the guy was versatile and could act. He wasn't known for playing heavies, but when he was mean he was great. Check him out as vicious and mean in My Darling Clementine, mean and funny in Support Your Local Sheriff, and mean, dominate and a little sympathetic in The Westerner. I think he earned his three Academy awards.
All in all, this is an entertaining movie that has stood up well to he passage of time. The DVD looks just fine.
Rating:
Summary: Watch it and run a cold bath while you're at it.
Review: As a life-long, happily straight female, even I had to question my sexuality momentarily when I watched Lauren Bacall in this picture. Certainly, Bogart is a pleasure to watch; cool, slightly vulnerable and ugly/handsome, as ever, but Bacall is truly radiant. Not just sexy, but quite impressive in her acting debut (she's 19...!!! Nuts.) It's hard to fathom, after having seen it, that she was actually so shy and nervous during filming that it was all she could do to keep from visibly shaking in her scenes (which I learned thanks to one of the DVD's special features). Some of the best scenes are either widely known ("just put your lips together...") or have already been mentioned by reviewers here, but there are plenty of other memorable ones to choose from, which are almost exclusively Bogart/Bacall collabs. The final scene where Bacall does the little shimmy on the way out of the hotel and Bogart grabs her arm and looks at her like his mind has been blown (which, it's conceivable, it was) always makes me grin.
The plot is decent but not spectacular. The fat dude cast as the evil French guy is a little cartoonish, even for the period. The dialogue, however, is tight and the, um, *fun* Bogart and Bacall must have had with each other is tangible in their every scene.
The Lux Radio broadcast in the special features is interesting. I didn't listen to whole thing, granted, but as this movie is before even my parents' time, I wasn't aware such broadcasts were a common promotional tool in the pre-home television era. The original between scene laundry detergent commercials are a riot and the banter at the end, with Bogie calling Bacall "Betty" (her given name) and her blowing the whistle he gave her in commemoration of the movie that brought them together, is rather cute I admit.
There's also a neat little documentary about how the two came together for the film.
Recommended.
Rating:
Summary: You Know How to Whistle Don't You?
Review: Excellent Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall vehicle. Bogart plays a Key West fishing boat captain, and Bacall a 22 year old woman that wishes she hadn't ran from home. They both wind up in German friendly Martinique. It starts with Bogart taking a man deep sea fishing for Marlin. Bogart meets Bacall at the Hotel and the magic begins. When Bogart is approached by free French supporters trying to avoid the Vischy French, things get hot. Directed by Howard Hawks masterfully, it is again another great movie for fans of movies like Casablance and Key West. Well worth adding to your library. The picture and sound quality are excellent and it includes several extras.
Rating:
Summary: The Quintessential Bogart Role
Review: When I first rented the movie I had no idea of the historical context and the script history, but after five or ten minutes it seemed to have a strong Hemingway influence. In short, this is a great movie, not his best, but one of the few that showcase that masculine tough guy role, sitting in a bar in some exotic location, and here with a very young Bacall. I think this is a better movie than many of his others. It is of course the movie where he meets Bacall. Bogart follows up this movie with The Big Sleep, Key Largo, and then Dark Passage all with Bacall.
Bogart made about 30 plus well know movies and starred or had important lead roles in at least another 20 to 30 relatively big movies, all over a period of about 25 years. He went through three phases or types of characters. What one sees with the early career of Bogart in the 1930's is a series of parts where he normally has some crime connection, i.e.; criminal or social worker or similar. This changed around 1941 after High Sierra, and he made a series of movies starting with Casablanca whre he played a certain role - as he plays here. Then in a final phase from about 1948 until his death he strayed far from the role he developed that made him famous in Casablanca and similar - in the time period 1940 to 1948.
In any case this present movie is closer to the quintessential or Rick of Casablanca character that we associate with Bogart, i.e.: macho, independent, helps the weak, holds his drink, gets the woman (or does not want her for different reasons), etc. Interestingly it is one of only a handful of similar Bogart movies made from 1940 to the late to early 1950s with this type of character - so it is a great movie to watch - as are some other movies such as his later but Oscar winning African Queen.
A few other excellent Bogart movies that are generally not well know but are still excellent are In a Lonely Place, Dark Passage, and the Treasure of the Sierra Madre. These are (also) 1940's movies and although not as good as Casablanca are among his best.
Rating:
Summary: An H & H production
Review: In my opinion, this movie's story is not all that interesting or original. As it's been said many times, To Have and Have Not is essentially Casablanca's twin sister, and bares almost no resemblance to the Ernest Hemingway novella. But despite it all, I must say that I prefer this movie as opposed to the other. What makes this movie so good are three things: the writing, the acting, and the real-life chemistry between the supercouple of the time, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. The screenplay has perhaps some of the most clever and memorable one-liners in movie history. In fact, this is the movie that produced the now-cliche saying "You do know how to whistle, don't you...just put your lips together, and blow," as well as the lesser-known but sure-to-bring-chills "It's even better when you help," sdaid after Bacall kisses Bogart. The acting is extremely good, especially since both the leads can be very cold and distant one moment, and very warm and sweet the next. Finally, as this movie will always be remembered for, Bogart and Bacall are clearly falling in love as the story is going, a case of art imitating life. The sexual tension in the beginning can be cut with a knife, while the true love in the middle and end is nothing short of romantic and touching. To Have and Have Not is a quintissential example of the stars making a subpar story into one of the most romantic films of the era. This is the perfect start in exploring the world of Bogart and Bacall, and perhaps the best of their four films.
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