A friend recently asked me if chemistry between actors is a real thing. One needs to look no further than TO HAVE AND HAVE NOT to know for sure. In revisiting Howard Hawks’ classic last night on the surprise, last-minute installment of Reel 13, it occurred to me that what makes the movie great is pretty much solely the chemistry between Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall.
Take away Bogart and Bacall and TO HAVE AND HAVE NOT is kind of hollow. I know, I know – it’s based on Hemingway, directed by Hawks with a screenplay co-written by William Faulkner. However, Hemingway’s book is adjusted and truncated for Hollywood purposes (both for practical reasons and in terms of content). The actual plot leftover isn’t strong enough or interesting enough to carry the film on its own. Important things go unexplained. (For example, Bogart’s Capt. Morgan is inexplicably great at everything. He’s a sailor, business owner, diplomat, surgeon, crack shot, ladies man and a superb wit. Where did he learn to do all that?) The supporting characters, with the exception of Walter Brennan’s DT-afflicted rummy, are flat and colorless (as opposed to those in say, CASABLANCA). The dialogue is very clever, but almost too clever. More and more, I find overly witty dialogue to feel contrived (how is it that I never think of anything that clever off the top of my head?), but here again, I give credit to Bogart and Bacall for making it work. Also, since many films of the time had a similar style of speaking and since films from the forties are our primary connection to the time, the dialogue feels natural for the time, or at least what we know of the time. (Does that make sense?)
In spite of my pointing out its shortcomings, I want to be clear that I still consider TO HAVE AND HAVE NOT to be masterful entertainment, but it’s the reason why it works so well that I find particularly interesting. I can’t think of another movie in history that was as reliant on the sexual tension between two actors. Certainly Tracy and Hepburn had rapport in ADAM’S RIB. Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan had a platonic, fun banter thing going on in WHEN HARRY MET SALLY. But none of them generate the pure, raw HEAT provided by Bogie and Bacall. The closest any recent film has come was probably Ralph Fiennes and Kristin Scott Thomas in THE ENGLISH PATIENT (I’m sure you guys have some thoughts on this – any other screen couples come close?) with the major difference of course being that Almasy and Katharine got to consummate their lust during the course of the film. It’s probably hotter, however, that all Capt. Morgan and Marie (a.k.a. "Slim") got to share were a few kisses – that mystery that makes all the difference – and that’s what makes this film what it is.