Dark Passage (1947)

DARK PASSAGE  (1947)  ¢ ¢ ¢ 1/2
    D: Delmer Daves
    Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Bruce Bennett,
    Agnes Moorehead, Tom D'Andrea, Douglas Kennedy
Bogart escapes from San Quentin in a barrel, makes his way to San Francisco with the help of a dame (Lauren Bacall), gets a new face with the help of a cabdriver who knows a back-alley plastic surgeon, and tries to find out who really murdered his wife - the rap that got him sent up in the first place. So Bogart's on the run, and the plot's a little crazy, and even the people you'd kind of like to trust you're never really sure you can trust, and this is film noir territory, obviously, with some famously subjective camerawork. (For the first half-hour or s0, till after the surgery, you never see Bogart's face.) That might be a gimmick, but it works in the context of the story, and if the ending seems a little upbeat for a 1940s thriller, it should be noted that Bogart and Bacall were newlyweds then, and happy, so maybe we can cut them some slack.