HUMPHREY BOGART & LAUREN BACALL 'TO HAVE AND HAVE NOT'

Title: TO HAVE AND HAVE NOT Director: Howard Hawks Year: 1944 Rating: ***1/2

Energetic, adventurous melodrama, which might evoke a great sense of CASABLANCA deja vu with the same basic premise: tough and independent Humphrey Bogart helps a group of foreign patriots for money, meeting within a smoky piano bar, and eventually comes around to the cause... 

Only the characters are based on the Ernest Hemingway novel, changing the location from Cuba to France as Bogart's Harry Morgan, a boat-for-hire fishing guide, gets reluctantly involved in smuggling two important people with the help of sultry siren Lauren Bacall and his alcoholic shipmate Eddy (Walter Brennan) as most of the film eventually narrows into one setting: although this hotel has a tavern area and many rooms, each providing Bogart ample time to outwit the local authorities whilst falling for Bacall and keeping his rummy sidekick alive. 

Poster for TO HAVE AND HAVE NOT