The summer of 1940 in Martinique as people began to choose sides is the setting for another Howard Hawks masterpiece. William Faulkner, who had adapted Raymond Chandler’s complex novel for the director’s other Bogart screen classic, “The Big Sleep,” expanded a thin Hemingway story with writing partner Jules Furthman into another. This is sort of “Casablanca” with grit rather than gloss, and is just as enjoyable. “To Have and Have Not” does, in fact, outshine that film with its upbeat ending, and marks the real contrast between the two films, despite their similarities.
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Bogart is Harry Morgan, trying to stay neutral about the local politics while he and his pal Eddie (Walter Brennan) take tourists ocean fishing in the waters of Martinique. His pal Frenchy (Marcel Dalio) wants him to use his boat to pick up a couple that will put him square in the middle of all that’s going on both in Martinique and the rest of the world as the Germans make their move across the globe.
Morgan is fending off getting involved just fine until his latest fishing customer gets knocked off by accident before he can pay up. Complicating things further for Morgan is a newcomer named Marie Browning (Lauren Bacall) who sort of attaches herself to him from the moment they meet. She has come from Brazil by way of Trinidad and ends up in Martinique only because she doesn’t have money to go any further. They seem a perfect fit despite all the sparring between them; a point driven home by her response to Eddie’s question about bees. The viewer knows at that moment that she and Harry are a match made in Hollywood heaven.
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Brennan is just terrific as Harry’s old pal in constant need of a drink to keep the shakes at bay. He thinks he’s looking after Harry when in fact it’s Harry who’s looking after him. The trademark male world of Howard Hawks is much in evidence here, as Bogart’s autonomy begins to crack only when he finds his match in Bacall. Like many of Hawks’ characters, Morgan lives by his own code and his own rules, and only breaks them out of loyalty to someone else. Another Hawks trademark of the sizing up of people from the inside out is also much in evidence here. Bogart and Bacall never even speak the other’s name in this film: she calls him “Steve” and he refers to her as “Slim” throughout the entire film.
When Harry finally agrees to pick up Frenchy’s pals in the Resistance to earn enough money to get Slim home, he gets more than he bargained for in more ways than one. It convinces Slim to stay on because she now knows for sure that “Steve” is the right guy. She gets a job singing for the piano player at the Hotel Martinique, Cricket (Hoagy Charmichael). And after a patrol boat takes a potshot at one of his passengers, his very beautiful wife begins to warm up to Harry in a big hurry, causing a bit of jealousy on Slim’s part. Doloros Moran is very nice and quite pretty as that wife, Hellene de Bursac.
There are a ton of great exchanges between Bacall and Bogart here, the most famous being the “just whistle” scene. There are many others equally as good, however, including an exchange about strings that has Bacall walking around Bogart, and a great line from Bacall about walking home if it weren’t for all that water. It is this latter exchange, and one other about Slim’s lack of a reaction when being slapped that Hawks uses to highlight the personal baggage both Harry and Marie are bringing to the table.
A young Bacall looks gorgeous in gowns by Milo Anderson, and Sid Hickox’s photography gives the film a real feel of a tiny island with palm trees lining the streets. Bogart’s Harry will eventually engage in the fight when he decides he likes the people on one side and doesn’t like the people on the other side. It is very much both a Hawks and Bogart type moment, the personal moral code of the anti-hero coming fully into play.
This is a fun film with great characters, lots of atmosphere, and an ending the polar opposite of “Casablanca.” The song “How Little We Know” from Hoagy Charmichael and Johnny Mercer never amounted to much compared to the more famous “As Time Goes By” from “Casablanca,” but works nicely with the mood Hawks created for his second film with Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. If you’re looking for a big dose of Bogie and Bacall, and want the kind of ending “Casablanca” didn’t have, then “To Have and Have Not” is a sure bet to please you. A fine film and a true screen classic.
Watching this movie can give you the vapors. Ye gods, has anyone’s big screen debut been as sizzling as that of the 19-year-old Lauren Bacall’s? Even 60 years later, Bacall’s sensual presence absolutely smolders on the screen. While this is not the most gripping Bogart performance one is likely to think of, he is nonetheless fascinating to watch in this film. As the film progresses, it is unmistakeable that he is absolutely HOOKED by his co-star.
The storyline itself is a conventional thriller for its time, although it has the distinction of being the product of two of the greatest American writers, Hemingway & Faulkner. Not that they would have seen much merit in that — Hemingway had a lukewarm attitude towards this work, and Faulkner hated every minute he spent in Hollywood, prostituting his talent (as he saw it).
This movie is not on a dramatic par with “Casablanca” or “The Maltese Falcon,” and the subsequent Bogart-Bacall “Key Largo” has far more suspense & tension within it. However, none of these films can equal “To Have and Have Not” for on-screen chemistry, and there is indeed something to be said for that. In fact, I would be hard-pressed to come up with a film that surpasses “To Have and Have Not” in terms of chemistry, and that should be enough for anyone to consider this a classic.
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