Product Details

• Actors: Ricardo Cortez, Una Merkel, Thelma Todd, Dudley Digges, Bebe Daniels
• Format: Black & White, NTSC
• Number of tapes: 1
• VHS Release Date: November 1, 2002
• Run Time: 79 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B00009RTCP
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #33,418 in Video (See Bestsellers in Video)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

(1931-USA). With BEBE DANIELS, RICARDO CORTEZ, DUDLEY DIGGES, UNA MERKEL, THELMA TODD. Based on a novel by DASHIELL HAMMETT. Here is an extraordinary and rarely-seen movie classic that tells one of the most famous and beloved of all mystery stories. The setting is San Francisco, and the hero is Dashiell Hammets tough-as-nails private eye, Sam Spade (played with a perfect blend of charm and roughness by Ricardo Cortez). Spade is depicted as a dapper ladies man who is one-half of the Spade & Archer Detective Agency. One day, a gorgeous mystery woman who calls herself Miss Wonderly comes to Spades office. Her story is that her sister has run off with a man and she wishes to hire Spade & Archer to track down her sibling. That night, Archer is dispatched to spy on the man and promptly turns up dead. What follows is a thrilling drama involving murder and mayhem and a search by various colorful, but desperate characters for a "a certain ornament" that is a twelve-inch-high black enamel figure of a bird-otherwise known as "The Maltese Falcon." In the end, Spade must wade his way through a cesspool of deceit as he does all in his power to sort out the various frauds and fakers. There is snappy dialogue galore, some of it deliciously risque. The result is a thrilling and endlessly fascinating "must-see" masterpiece. Highly recommended. 79 minutes.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Original, Intriguing Film Version of The Maltese Falcon, November 14, 2003

By	Gary F. Taylor "GFT" (Biloxi, MS USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

In 1931 Roy Del Ruth became the first director to bring Dashiell Hammett's THE MALTESE FALCON to the screen. Although it received favorable reviews and did a brisk business at the box office, like many early talkies it was soon eclipsed by ever-advancing technology and forgotten--until television, with its endless demands for late-late show material, knocked on Hollywood's door. Retitled DANGEROUS FEMALE in order to avoid confusion with the highly celebrated 1941 version, it has haunted the airwaves ever since.

DANGEROUS FEMALE is interesting in several ways, and perhaps most deeply so as an example of the struggle that ensued when sound first roared. What had proven effective on the silent screen suddenly seemed highly mannered when voices were added, and both directors and stars struggled to find new techniques--and DANGEROUS FEMALE offers a very vision of the issues involved.

It is a myth that the advent of sound forced directors to lock down the camera, but it is true that many directors preferred simple camera set-ups in early sound films; it gave them one less thing to worry about. And with this film, Roy Del Ruth is no exception: in a visual sense, DANGEROUS FEMALE is fairly static. The performing decisions made by the various actors are also illustrative and informative, particularly re leads Ricardo Cortez and Bebe Daniels. Cortez is still clearly performing in the "silent mode," and he reads as visually loud; Daniels, however, has elected to underplay, and while she is stiff by current standards, her performance must have seemed startlingly innovative at the time. And then there are two performers who are very much of the technology: Una Merkle as Spade's secretary and Thelma Todd as Iva Archer, both of whom seem considerably more comfortable with the new style than either Cortez or Daniels.

The film is also interesting as a "Pre-Code" picture, for it is sexually explicit in ways most viewers will not expect from a 1930s film, and indeed it is surprisingly explicit even in comparison to other pre-code films. Hero Sam Spade is a womanizer who seduces every attractive female who crosses his path--and the film opens with a shot of just such a woman pausing to straighten her stockings before leaving his office. Still later, the dubious Miss Wonderly tempts Spade with her cleavage, lolls in his bed after a thick night, splashes in his bathtub, and finally winds up stripped naked in his kitchen!

It is also interesting, of course, to compare DANGEROUS FEMALE to its two remakes. Directed by William Dieterle and starring Warren William and Bette Davis, the 1936 SATAN MET A LADY would put Hammett's plot through the wringer--and prove a critical disaster and a box office thud. But then there is the justly celebrated 1941 version starring Humphrey Bogart and Mary Astor under the direction of John Huston.

Both the 1931 and 1941 films lifted great chunks of dialogue from Hammett's novel, and very often the dialogue is line-for-line the same. But two more completely different films could scarcely be imagined. Where the 1931 film strives for an urbane quality, the 1941 film is memorably gritty--and in spite of being hampered by the production, considerably more sexually suggestive as well, implying the homosexuality of several characters much more effectively than the 1931 version dared.

In the final analysis, the 1931 THE MALTESE FALCON (aka DANGEROUS FEMALE) will appeal most to those interested in films that illustrate the transition between silent film and sound, to collectors of "pre-code" movies, and to hardcore FALCON fans who want everything associated with Hammett, his novel, and the various film versions. But I hesitate to recommend it generally; if you don't fall into one of those categories, you're likely to be unimpressed.

GFT, Amazon reviewer

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Original Maltese Falcon Film, October 26, 2005

By	John Billheimer - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This is the first filming of Dasheill Hammett's classic detective story. It predates the John Huston/Humphrey Bogart version by ten years and follows the novel closely. Ricardo Cortez makes a much more smarmy Sam Spade than Bogart, and the pre-code production makes explicit much of what Huston had to hint at. It's worth watching, if only to compare it with the 1941 version and marvel at the inspired casting that made the later work one of the greatest mystery films ever.

5.0 out of 5 stars A Must See Movie, May 6, 2009

By	Joel Jacobs (Formerly Milan and Naples Italy) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

While the movie with Bogart grabs all the glory this original film is the better of the two. I like both films but this has become my favorite.