Key Largo (film)

Key Largo
theatrical release poster
Directed by	John Huston
Produced by	Jerry Wald
Written by	Maxwell Anderson (play) Richard Brooks John Huston
Starring	Humphrey Bogart Edward G. Robinson Lauren Bacall Lionel Barrymore Claire Trevor
Music by	Max Steiner
Cinematography	Karl Freund
Editing by	Rudi Fehr
Distributed by	Warner Bros.
Release date(s)	July 16, 1948 (1948-07-16)
Running time	101 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Box office	US$8,125,000

Key Largo is a 1948 film noir directed by John Huston and starring Humphrey Bogart, Edward G. Robinson, Lauren Bacall, Lionel Barrymore, and Claire Trevor. The movie was adapted by Richard Brooks and Huston from Maxwell Anderson's 1939 play of the same name, which played on Broadway for 105 performances in 1939 and 1940.

Key Largo was the fourth and final film pairing of married actors Bogart and Bacall. Trevor won the 1948 Academy Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role for her performance.

Plot

Ex-Major Frank McCloud (Humphrey Bogart) visits a Key Largo hotel run by James Temple (Lionel Barrymore), the father of McCloud's World War II buddy, and his daughter-in-law Nora (Lauren Bacall), the friend's widow, to pay his respects. Temple is deep in grief over the death of his son, and is under the impression that he died a hero in Italy. McCloud does not disabuse him of this, and at Temple's urging he relates exactly the story Temple wants to hear, although it is apparent that McCloud was the actual hero. Nora later confirms this, having had a letter from her husband with the true story.

McCloud finds out that the visitors who are staying at the hotel, supposedly on a fishing trip, are actually notorious fugitive gangster Johnny Rocco (Edward G. Robinson) and his gang. The gangsters have crossed by boat from Cuba, where Rocco is living in exile, to make a "delivery". Once Rocco's identity is revealed by McCloud, the mobsters drop the pretense and take over the hotel, keeping McCloud, Temple and Nora at bay with the threat of violence; meanwhile, a hurricane is brewing up, heading in the direction of the Key.

After a local deputy is subdued and captured by the gang, Frank rejects an apparent opportunity to kill Rocco when the gangster throws him a pistol and dares him to shoot. McCloud's unwillingness to act raises doubts about his courage, but Rocco's abasement of his alcoholic mistress, singer Gaye Dawn (Claire Trevor), and his hand in the murders of the deputy and two local Indians convinces Frank that Rocco must be stopped. His chance comes when Rocco forces Frank to pilot the gang's boat back to Cuba. Once at sea, Frank kills off each member of the gang one-by-one, ending with Rocco. The gang dead, he turns the boat back to Key Largo, where Nora awaits him.

Cast

• Humphrey Bogart as Frank McCloud
• Edward G. Robinson as Johnny Rocco
• Lauren Bacall as Nora Temple
• Lionel Barrymore as James Temple
• Claire Trevor as Gaye Dawn
• Thomas Gomez as Richard "Curly" Hoff           
• Harry Lewis as Edward "Toots" Bass

• John Rodney as Deputy Clyde Sawyer
• Marc Lawrence as Ziggy
• Dan Seymour as Angel Garcia
• Monte Blue as Sheriff Ben Wade
• William Haade as Ralph Feeney
• Jay Silverheels as John Osceola
• Rodd Redwing as Tom Osceola

Production

The script was adapted from a 1939 play by Maxwell Anderson. In the play, the gangsters are Mexican bandidos, the war in question is the Spanish Civil War, and Frank is a disgraced deserter who dies at the end.

Robinson had always had top billing over Bogart in their previous films together. For this movie, Robinson's name appears to the right of Bogart's, but placed a little higher on the posters, and also in the film's opening credits, to indicate Robinson's near-equal status. Robinson's image was also markedly larger and centered on the original poster, with Bogart relegated to the background. In the film's trailer, Bogart is repeatedly mentioned first but Robinson's name is listed above Bogart's in a cast list at the very end.

Exterior shots of the hurricane that delays the gang's getaway were actually taken from stock footage used in Night Unto Night, a Ronald Reagan melodrama made the same year by Warner Bros.

Song

Author Philip Furia discussed "where Claire Trevor sings the song 'Moanin' Low.'" The song is "about a woman who's trapped in a relationship with a very cruel man. And ... you see [Trevor as Gaye] realize that that's exactly her real life situation. [Trevor's performance] slowly break[s] down, and her voice falters and she sings off key." Robinson is dismissive but "Bogart pours her a stiff drink, walks it over ... under gunpoint ... and gives it to her and says 'You deserve this' -- it's just a great dramatic scene, [and] it's a wonderful use of a song in a non-musical picture. [Trevor] won [the Academy Award] based purely, I think, on that performance."

Awards and Nominations

• AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes and Villains:
  • Johnny Rocco - Nominated Villain
• AFI's 10 Top 10 - Nominated Gangster Film

In popular culture

• The 1981 song "Key Largo", by singer-songwriter Bertie Higgins, draws heavily on influences from the film. This song hit the Top 10 on the pop chart in the United States and went to #1 on the adult contemporary chart.
• One scene in the "Vapors" episode of seaQuest DSV during the second season showed Tim O'Neill and Lonnie Henderson coming out of an interactive theme park version of the film.

References

Notes

External links

• Key Largo at the Internet Movie Database
• Key Largo at the TCM Movie Database
• Key Largo at AllRovi
• Key Largo at Film Virtual History
• Radio adaptation of the film by Lux Radio Theater, originally broadcast on November 28, 1949 and hosted at the Internet Archive