Sirocco - Zwischen Kairo und Damaskus

(Marta Toren to Bogie)....what a great line! I'm surprised it hasn't gone down in the lexicon of great movie quips...and it captures perfectly the paradoxical mystery of Bogie's eternal charm, as well as the mystery of how an essentially mediocre film can be redeemed by its own dry, sardonic charm (due largely to help from fine supporting players as much as from Bogie), some great B/W photography, and a persistently downbeat refusal to push any sort of patriotic agenda.(adding greatly to that charm quotient.) The postwar noir influence is in fine fettle here. So Bogie doesn't exactly have a great motivation for his final decision? He just changed his mind, that's all. Take it or leave it. "I've taken long chances before. Okay." What could be better than that? It's the way people act every day. Every good critical eye without a mote in it knows that this film is safely and securely within the universe of the best product Hollywood ever put out, a great, mordant, counterweight universe to the unwatchable sap they themselves were producing right alongside it. "Sirocco" is not even really that minor a star in that universe. Good, good, good.

Not a great flick, but interesting to see that conflicts between foreign occupiers and arab locals has been going on for a long time, with similar results. Its a recurring theme in Arabia - foreign armies come in hoping to pacify the locals, only to fall into a bloody pattern of terrorism and retribution. The amazing thing is that its been going on for so long and in so many places. It's an insight on today's middle-east events.

And like so many middle-east conflicts, in this movie you are left being not very sympathetic to either side. Yes, its the Syrian's home, but their tactics are sickening. The French come off no better as the aggressors and oppressors. The third parties, such as Bogart's character, are just vultures feeding off the tragedy.

Good one to watch if you're thinking of invading an Arab nation.

Bogie's role was not really unsympathetic unless you happen to be a Francophile. This can be looked at as a prequel to Casablanca. Harry is very much like a young Rick would have been in 1925. Problem is, Bogie is 10 years older and is basically playing Rick as he was in the 20's. The woman is,though, one of the most unsympathetic creatures ever in films. High maintenance, manipulative, out for everything she can get wherever she can get it. Damn sexy too. Not by any means a great picture but if you like Bogie and you like older films, it is worth a summer night.

In a way Bogart's greatest performances have left Sirocco "priced out of the market." I won't argue that it's on the same level as Casablanca, The Maltese Falcon, or Key Largo, but it is a surprisingly nuanced picture that gets unfairly criticized for not living up to some of the greatest films Hollywood ever produced.

Bogie is Bogie, tough-talking and trenchcoat-wearing as usual. He plays Harry Smith, a man who, ordinarily, doesn't take sides, but this time, see... there's a dame! That sounds a little dismissive, it's not meant to be. Nobody's ever played a "shades of gray" character quite like Bogart, in my opinion he could have done it a dozen *more* times.

Swedish actress Märta Torén (pegged as 'The Next Ingrid Bergman') is the dame. She really seems almost as out-of-place in the picture as she would have been in war-torn Damascus. Lee J. Cobb, playing the French commander Col. Feroud, chews the scenery a little but overall he gives a good portrayal of a man fighting for a cause he no longer believes in.

I'm a fan of both Zero Mostel (the original Max Bialystock) and Nick Dennis (the exuberant Greek mechanic from 'Kiss Me Deadly') and they both have good if small roles here.

I was impressed by the way Sirocco refused to overtly side with either the French or the Syrians. Neither does the film present Smith as anything but what he is, an opportunist. In fact, for me, it his teetering on the brink of whether to take sides or stay neutral (and thus be true to his own self-serving moral code) that provides the film's best drama.

This 1951 Bogart vehicle, produced by the great man himself, and directed by the estimable Curtis Bernhardt, is a slow-moving rehash of some of Bogart's better known films, going back to Casablanca. This one's set in 1925 Syria, with the Trenchcoated One working both sides against the middle. He's a gun runner selling arms to the Arabs, which at the time was illegal, since Syria was controlled by the French. Bogart had an affinity with the Levant, and was most at ease in an occupied city, with terrorists, revolutionaries and criminals,--often hard to tell apart--running around, blowing up things, and making life difficult for the authorities. As usual, Bogart couldn't care less who wins as long as he gets paid.

Sirocco is a back lot picture, yet an attractive one. It was made at a time when movies of its type were getting either a whole lot bigger or a whole lot smaller. As such it was somewhat of an anachronism when it came out, and its box-office was modest. This was really the end of the line for the old-style Bogart pics, which it is the last of; and Bogie's next movie, The African Queen, filmed on location and in color, would open up a whole new career for him. I like this one better than most people do, for its cast (Marta Toren, Lee Cobb, Everett Sloan, Gerald Mohr), and its shabby fatalism. A good deal of the picture is set indoors, in cafés, hotel rooms and warehouses. There is a circular, labyrinthine aspect to the movie, as it seems at times as if all the action were taking place literally underground, with the various characters moving from cavern to cavern.