Bonus Ep. 4—FRISCO NOIR With Rachel Walther—The Maltese Falcon No.1 (1931) & No.2 (1941) and Dark Passage (1947)

In this episode, the first of a series,  Knox Bronson, host of "The Secret History of Frisco" podcast, welcomes Rachel Walther, a film noir expert and author, to discuss the genre's connection to San Francisco. Walther, who writes for the Film Noir Foundation's "Noir City" magazine and has a forthcoming book on "Dog Day Afternoon," highlights San Francisco's significant role in film, particularly after World War II, due to its cinematic landscape and the rise of on-location shooting. The conversation then delves into two adaptations of "The Maltese Falcon," the 1931 and 1941 versions. While the 1941 film, directed by John Huston and starring Humphrey Bogart, is widely considered a foundational noir, the 1931 version, starring Ricardo Cortez, is noted for its different interpretation of Sam Spade and its more studio-bound production.

The discussion also explores the historical context of San Francisco in the 1930s and 40s, touching upon the city's organized crime elements and how those were rarely directly depicted in films of the era. Walther explains that '30s films set in San Francisco often harked back to the Barbary Coast lore rather than contemporary issues. She attributes the surge of on-location shooting in San Francisco in the post-war period to lighter camera equipment and filmmakers' desire to move beyond studio sets, inspired by Italian neorealism. The interview concludes with a focus on the Film Noir Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to film restoration, highlighting their magazine and restored films like "Woman on the Run" and "The Man Who Cheated Himself," both shot extensively in San Francisco in the late 1940s and early 1950s—considered the golden era of noir in the city.

Transcript

Knox
(train chugging) (bell ringing) (horn blowing) Frisco: The Secret History, a podcast. (instrumental music) Hi, this is Knox Bronson at The Secret History of Frisco podcast, and we have a really great, uh, episode for you today. We're talking to Rachel Walther, who, uh, is very involved in the noir, uh, community of film and history. Uh, Rachel, hi. 

Rachel
Hi. Thanks for having me. 

Knox
Thank you. Uh, do you wanna just tell us a little bit about your background and your book you have coming out and stuff like that? 

Rachel
Oh, sure. I mean, I've been a, sort of an obsessive movie watcher for most of my life, and, uh, currently I write pretty regularly, uh, for the Film Noir Foundation's magazine, Noir City, uh, about film noir movies from the classic period as well as more contemporary films. And, uh, for the better part of the last few years, I've been working on a book tracing the history of Dog Day Afternoon, both the making of the film and the crazy true life, uh, you know, true crime story that inspired it. And so, that's due out from Head Press, a UK publisher, uh, next spring, and it's gonna, it's called Born to Lose: The Misfits Who Made Dog Day Afternoon. So, I'm just starting to sort of ramp up, um, working with publishers to promote that book, and, uh, just also to celebrate its 50th anniversary. 

Knox
Yeah. Wow, that's great. Um, so, um, I thought we would, would start talking about, you know, San Francisco is home to, uh, uh, uh, about, I don't know, would it be two decades of movies or- or more, uh, that were noir, set in San Francisco, or- 

Rachel
Oh, gosh. Yeah, I mean, I th- it's, you know, from the early, I think since the sound era really, San Francisco's always had a particular place in film. And then especially after the war, they started shooting on location there fairly regularly, I think sort of to a disproportionate degree in the sense of based on its population. There was New York, LA, and then just a ton (laughs) of movies in San Francisco. And it also did have a resurgence, I'd say the '70s and the '90s, Dirty Harry- 

Knox
Right. 

Rachel
... things like that. It kee- it kept cropping up as a great location for crime films. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. Well, um, we were gonna talk about perhaps The Maltese Falcon- 

Rachel
Yeah. 

Knox
... the 1931 version and the 1941. 

Rachel
Yeah. I mean, e- everyone thinks that, of course, like the '41 version, some folks consider it one of the first films to kind of usher in the film noir era. Other folks sort of say, "No, no, no, it's proto-noir. It's really before that genre, or excuse me, the movement g- got going." But sort of however way you look at it, it really brought the detective story into the streets, into the here and now of contemporary life, and it's a story that's really inseparable from the city. And so, it's- it's sort of its own character, I'd say, as, and it's part of the story. But I know, um, you've, uh, they did do an earlier version, you know, right after the nov- shortly after the novel was published, in 1931. Not nearly as many folks have seen that. But as it's become more widely available, home video and streaming, I think there's reasons to appreciate it on its own merits. If you compare it against the film directed by John Huston starring Humphrey Bogart, it's- it's gonna be hard to compare. But I think there's a lot of aspects that give it its own character. What- what struck you about it when you saw it? 

Knox
The early one? 

Rachel
Yeah. 

Knox
Well, you know, as I mentioned earlier, um, before we were recording, I mean, Humphrey Bogart is Sam Spade. 

Rachel
Yeah. (laughs) 

Knox
So, and so this other guy, it was, he was more of a joker. 

Rachel
Ricardo Cortez. 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
Yeah, I- I love him. 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
I love that actor, and I think he's- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
He was really good at playing those types of cads. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. Um, I should have mentioned, by the time this episode appears, you can go to thesecrethistoryoffrisco.com and watch the early version. 

Rachel
Oh, very nice. 

Knox
They have it up there. 

Rachel
Yeah. 

Knox
So, yeah. Um, I downloaded it. Um, but it was, well, it was just so different. It didn't have Peter Lorre, it didn't have Sydney Greenstreet. 

Rachel
Mm-hmm. 

Knox
Uh, the story seemed a little different, and it, and it, I think even the heroine's name was, I thought it was Brigid O'Shaughnessy. 

Rachel
It's a weird thing they do in- in- in the story and in the '41 version, she sh- first shows up and gives an alias, Ruth Wonderly. 

Knox
Oh, right. 

Rachel
Then as the film, as the story gets going- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... she admits her real name is Brigid O'Shaughnessy. 

Knox
Oh, right. 

Rachel
And I suspect for the '31 version, they just didn't wanna give audiences that confusion. So they just kept Ruth Wonderly through the whole film. 

Knox
Yeah. Well, also it- it seemed it was mostly shot in the interiors. 

Rachel
Yeah. 

Knox
And not out on the, you know, much, not much of the San Francisco atmosphere. 

Rachel
It's very studio bound. Yeah, I think there's a little sequence that, in like a back lot, where they try to pass it off as Chinatown adjacent, but- 

Knox
Was it shot in San Francisco? 

Rachel
No. 

Knox
Oh, no? 

Rachel
No. 

Knox
Oh. 

Rachel
No, it was, it was very, uh, I mean- 

Knox
Oh. 

Rachel
... it was '31, so it was pretty studio bound. I think also out of practicality, 'cause I think it was still the era where they had to have microphones sort of placed around the set- 

Knox
Right. 

Rachel
... to pick, to pick it up. And so, a lot of m- not a lot of movies from that era went out and about. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
Um, but it's-... it's still, um... I'm trying to think. There's a couple of moments, like, I think when Ricardo Cortez as Sam Spade, when he's talking to a bystander and he speaks Chinese to him, trying to s- like, "Oh, hey, what did you see?" Little aspects of that try to, try to stamp it in sort of the older part of the city. 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
But it- it sort of does what it can, and, uh, there's a couple of, uh, stock establishing shots, but that's about it. 

Knox
But that was a, that was a cool moment ... I like that. 

Rachel
Yeah, yeah. And that made me think, um, in the... to jump ahead a bit, uh, in Lady from Shanghai, Rita Hayworth too, since she's from that par-... you know, since she was either... lived in that part of the world for a while, or her character was from there, when there's a sequence where she's trying to find Orson Welles' character in Chinatown, she's talking to all the local merchants trying to figure out where he's hiding out. And so, it's, um, it's a nice connection that it's a... gives the city... reminds you that the city has a very international feel to it, maybe compared to some other towns they might have chosen. 

Knox
Well, when did they start shooting films in San Francisco? 

Rachel
Oh, gosh. I... uh, I mean, mostly after the, after the war, I think a lot- 

Knox
After World War II? 

Rachel
... for bo-... for practical reasons. 

Knox
Okay. 

Rachel
I mean, again, I'm sure someone might correct me- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... with that. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
But it's just cameras became lighter- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... easier to use, easier to shoot. And, um, a lot of filmmakers really wanted to get out of the studios. I think they were- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... inspired a little, you know, by the neorealists that were co-... those films that were coming over from Italy that a lot of folks caught up with after the war. And, and I think as you mentioned before we were talking, there was a huge boom in population from servicemen that passed through the city. So, a lot of folks became more familiar with the town, and a lot of folks, I think, had a... maybe they didn't live there, but they had a good association or a good memory of it. It's sort of like a party city, like New Orleans. And the city's just so cinematic, and it's kinda hard to recreate in the studio, too. 

Knox
Oh, yeah. 

Rachel
Like, all these weird natural Dutch angles that the city offers. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
And no matter where you shoot, you're gonna get something gorgeous in the background, either a long wild street that curves down and then back up, or Coit Tower, the Golden Gate Bridge. And so, it was really just a director and a cinematographer's dream to do setups there. And there's a lot of, I think particularly to noir, the idea of having empty streets, shadows, fog, is way easier to plausibly contain within something that's considered realistic than, say, New York or LA, where it's just this smash of people, smash of urban sprawl. San Francisco has all... still has those nooks and crannies, and it's very neighborhood-y. So, you could establish yourself there and, um, shoot something really interesting. 

Knox
Well, in the '30s, there, there were, like, three distinct groups, uh, that were running the city. 

Rachel
Mm-hmm. 

Knox
There was, uh, in North Beach was the... a, a small element of the Italian mafia- 

Rachel
Oh. 

Knox
... uh, the Lanza crime family. And, uh, they ran a lot of traditional organized crime stuff, and also owned half of, uh, Fisherman's Wharf. 

Rachel
Oh, okay. 

Knox
The other half of Fisherman's Wharf was owned by a guy name... a Sicilian by the name of Alioto, whose son later became the mayor of San Francisco. 

Rachel
I was gonna say, yeah, that name- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... rang a bell. 

Knox
And, uh, and then there, there were, there were the McDonough brothers, who were bail bondsmen, and they basically had a network with, with police and prosecutors and, uh, o- o- organized crime vice, I should say. And you could not open a gambling house or a, or a house of prostitution without their permission, and also amassed some kickbacks to them as well. 

Rachel
(laughs) Yeah. 

Knox
But on top of that, you had the police that basically ran everything, were in charge of everything, and they took kickbacks from everybody. And, uh, in 1937, uh, there was, um... they took in about a million dollars, which is about $30 million today. 

Rachel
Oh, wow. Wow. 

Knox
And the population was only 645,000 at the time, so... 

Rachel
How did the war affect those rackets or industries, whatever you'd wanna say? What... did it- 

Knox
Well, this is actually... at the end of the '30s, there was, uh, the... what they... what was known as the Atherton Report- 

Rachel
Oh, okay. 

Knox
... and that kind of busted that all up. And then a guy named Bones Remmer came to town in the early '40s. He was a mob guy from the Cal-Neva Lodge, and he, he came to San Francisco. And he was already running the gambling in San Francisco, and, um, the town of E- Emeryville, stuff like that. 

Rachel
Oh, okay. 

Knox
So, it really much more opened it up to the actual mafia at that point in San Francisco. But, uh, anyway, I don't... I mean, I'm trying to remember... that stuff didn't seem... that I've seen, and I'm not... maybe you've seen more of it reflected in the movies. 

Rachel
Honestly, no, I, I think really the '30s in San Francisco is a really untapped well- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... of stories. 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
Or it's, it's... in the film noir era, it's very much about, uh, fictional tales, time and place, not so much historical this is what happened, it happened here, say, in the same way New York had a lot of stories come out. 

Knox
Well, in the '30s, were there any movies shot in San Francisco- 

Rachel
Mm-hmm. 

Knox
... or were they just set in San Francisco- 

Rachel
Set- 

Knox
... inspired by San Francisco? 

Rachel
And a lot of them were still hearkening back to the Barbary Coast lore. 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
Like The Frisco Kid, which- 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... funny enough, Ricardo Cortez is in that- 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... um, starring James Cagney. Barbary Coast, I'm... my brain is telling me Edward G. Robinson's in that, but I could be wrong. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
Um, it was really that. You get the vision of the, the player piano- 

Knox
The Frisco Kid. 

Rachel
... and the big mustache. 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
It's very... or I'd like to say Gentleman Jim- 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... with Errol Flynn. It was really the era of, you know, wooden sidewalks, lots of mud, the vision of San Francisco- 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... as a city coming up, and then the earthquake- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... was really that. And it wasn't, um...... it, but then, yeah, after the war, that's really when you started to see the dynamic city and all of its layers of history and contemporary life, um- 

Speaker 3
Wa- was the second- 

Rachel
... depicted. 

Speaker 3
... Maltese Falcon shot in San Francisco? 

Rachel
They did s- a couple exterior shots, but I wanna say that I think a lot of that's second unit. Um- 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... I'm trying to remember the scenes where it's Bogart out and about. M- maybe one or two, but again, mostly, they'd do a second unit shot of the city and then the players in the studio. So it, it's still very studio-bound, and I think that's what- 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... one of the things that ties the two versions together is, to me, I f- think of the Maltese Falcon as maybe more of a proto-noir 'cause it's still very airless. It, there's a lot of folks talking in rooms, and there's that stuffy quality to it, which I think adds to the tension because it's all about trying to get to people's real motivations and w- who's telling the truth, what's going on. But the action's more determined by people's motivations than, say, chases or chase sequences are. You know, there's not a lot of, um... All the action is dialogue-driven, rather than shot on location. Um, but it's, uh, it- it's more evocative of the city, for sure. They do show- 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... a bit more. 

Speaker 3
When, when was the Frisco Kid made? 

Rachel
'36, I think. 

Speaker 3
Okay, so there, there's a number of movies from the '30s. 

Rachel
Yeah. N- it s- it didn't really become a hotspot of interest, I'd say, and I can imagine, yeah, a lot of that was maybe driven by the war. And so- 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... a lot of folks came into the city and saw- 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... saw everything it had to offer, and more independent productions s- wanted to, you know, started to get underway, so they'd do the shooting and then work under a larger studio to get it distributed, like say Woman on the Run was an independent production made in like '49, put out in 1950 with- starring Ann Sheridan and Dennis O'Keefe, and that is virtually, I think that's all shot on location in San Francisco. And that's liter- as the name suggests, it's Ann Sheridan running around town, or maybe sauntering around town's a better way to put it. 

Speaker 3
What year was that? 

Rachel
'49, '50. 

Speaker 3
Oh, okay. 

Rachel
And, although ironically, the main, the, the big sort of finale set piece that's supposed to take place at Playland, they shot it in Long Beach. For- 

Speaker 3
Hm. 

Rachel
... a number of reasons, I think it just worked out better if they did it in Long Beach, but they still feature Laughing Sal as a main character that they can sort of hear throughout the final sequence. But there were two Sals, so that kind of doubled nicely. But yeah, it's, and it... And so, I think it was a, it's an era that you've alluded to in some of your previous shows. 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
Right around '53 when the city shut down- 

Speaker 3
Yeah. 

Rachel
... you actually have more visual evidence of San Francisco at that time in noir films. It's like a city sort of trying to wrestle with its lawless past under the confines of, you know, syndicate-style corruption is still going on. A lot of people were just disenfranchised after the war, trying to start their lives over again. And SF was just a really, like, visually evocative place to throw, throw characters and see what happens. 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. So, um, who directed the '31 version? 

Rachel
It was, uh, Roy Del Ruth, who... He's very much just sort of a journeyman Warner Brothers guy. 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
He did a lot, a lot of Cagney films, comedies, dramas in equal measure. So I think- 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... um, that's one thing that... I mean, I think Roy Del Ruth's definitely a delightful director, but I don't really think anyone working on that 1931 production thought it was anything special. 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
They were just adapting a straight-up detective story, maybe a little bit different. I personally think, um, Ricardo Cortez really adds a dynamism to his depiction of Sam Spade that, I think, is actually more in keeping with Dashiell Hammett's version of him. You know, in the book, he's a real louse for a lot of it. 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. Yeah. 

Rachel
And I think there's a line, something like, you know, like when he smiled, it was all Vs. And he compares him to Satan and Cortez really just relished playing those sort of good bad guys. 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
And I think when... In Bogart's version, he maybe gives him too much heart. I mean- 

Speaker 3
Yeah. 

Rachel
... not to knock it in that way, but what I mean to say is, is his depiction transcends the Spade on the page into something that really works well for the film and is iconic. 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
But, you know, Cor- Cortez has got a zing to him, just if I can't, if I haven't already plugged it enough. 

Speaker 3
Yeah. 

Rachel
Um, and so, I think that's where a lot of the difference comes in was 'cause with the '41 version that we all know much better, it was John Huston's first... It was his debut directorial feature. And so, he was really trying hard. (laughs) He really- 

Speaker 3
Yeah. 

Rachel
... wanted to make this special. 

Speaker 3
I didn't realize that was his first movie. 

Rachel
Yeah, I mean, he, I think he'd done second unit stuff and, you know- 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... he was a Hollywood kid. His father- 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... Walter Huston, was a huge star in the '30s- 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... and continued to be. Uh, and you know, they worked together on Treasure of the Sierra Madre- 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... and so, I mean, Walter Huston was an icon, not as well-known today as he was then. But, um, and John Huston and, and Bogart, I think, already had a rapport, so that helped. Like, they had a prior relationship and it's just one of those situations where everything coalesced- 

Speaker 3
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... into making it a special film. It was still low-budget. I mean, I don't think Warner Brothers was trying to make it quite like the prestige A-picture it's ended up becoming in our, in our minds. And Mary Astor was a great actress that had been around. I mean, she could just as easily, I think, have starred in the '31 version. I think she was with a different studio back in those days. But she, she had a great career in the early '30s in Hollywood that was a bit tarnished by scandal in the late '30s. So, by the time the '41 Falcon came around, she was kind of the perfect mix of like a great lady that we were familiar with, but maybe she was capable of certain things-... like, sort of off color that we weren't, we weren't aware of. 

Knox
Was there any particular story behind the remake that, why they decided to do it, or was it just- 

Rachel
I think it's Warner Brothers owned the rights still. It was still a property that they had. And I think with John Huston was looking for a project. It wasn't gonna cost them any extra money to bring it out. And again, please, if, if anyone knows more details than that, correct me. But, it was easy, honestly. And I think it was a story that appealed to them, uh, because of the, all those different things. It was a way for sort of John Huston to really show that he could make a film that was a bit darker, a bit more intense. And- 

Knox
Are, are there any other Dashiell Hammett stories, um, that have been made into movies? 

Rachel
Yeah, um, I'm tryna... The Glass Key, which was his last novel, he did it after Maltese Falcon. That, oh, I'm bla- I'm blanking on the year. It's a very studio-bound movie, but that's got... that was like an Alan Ladd-Veronica Lake vehicle. And Brian Donlaveys III, the third player, big player in that. And that, um, it's, it's a bit of a convoluted plot. It's like a, it's a political, it's more of a political thriller. And it does have crime elements to it, so it's, you know, it's totally thrown into this noir conversation. But it's, say for instance, if you're trying to choose between This Gun for Hire or, you know, one of the other films, I would maybe go with that. Glass Key's a, for me it's a little stuffy also. And, uh, another novel that he made, Red Harvest- 

Knox
Yes. 

Rachel
... that's been adapted in a lot of, uh, really creative ways. 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
Even, uh, 'cause it's the story of this guy that's sort of playing two... I'm trying to think about it, like just two s- sort of crime entities against each other. So it was- 

Knox
That wasn't San Francisco, was it? I thought it was a small town somewhere. 

Rachel
It is. 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
It's... Oh, I'm, I'm spacing on exactly- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... and I'm- 

Knox
That was- 

Rachel
I know, I'll note right after the- 

Knox
I just, I- 

Rachel
So that's everything from- 

Knox
Okay. 

Rachel
... Fistful of Dollars- 

Knox
Right. Yeah. 

Rachel
... is a version of Red Harvest. 

Knox
Wow. 

Rachel
And then I, oh my gosh, I'm, there was a version with Last Man Standing with Bruce Willis is Red Harvest. 

Knox
Really? 

Rachel
Yeah. 

Knox
Wow. 

Rachel
They also did do, I remember clearly, oh, I'm trying to remember the year. I wanna say maybe 2013, 2014, at the Film, at the Film Noir Festival in San Francisco, there was a full day of Hammett, Hammett adaptations. And he began the day with Red Harvest, which was a film he literally, when he came out on stage, he's like, "I haven't even seen this movie. We found this print. We're gonna show it. We don't know what to expect. It has barely anything to do with the story." It was sort of an odd mix of crime and vaudeville, Jimmy Durante's in it at one point. That's like, that's the extent of the memory I have about the film. Um, so it's, it keeps cropping up, but rarely is it a straightforward version. Oh, another plug, um, mid to late '90s, uh, a, um, Yojimbo, the Kurosawa film. 

Knox
Yes. 

Rachel
And so Fresh is, I think, more of a remake of Yojimbo. But it's that same thing. So Red Harvest, whether he, whether Hammett gets credit or not, that's a story that comes up again and again. But Fresh is, um, that tale placed in, um, I wanna say either Brooklyn or the Bronx, where it's a young drug runner in his teens playing off against two rival drug gangs in sort of the inner city setting. That's a great movie. Samuel L. Jackson co-stars. 

Knox
Let's talk about the Film Noir Foundation for a while- 

Rachel
Oh, fantastic. Yes. 

Knox
... it was founded in San Francisco. 

Rachel
Yes. 

Knox
Freddy, Eddie Muller is a- 

Rachel
Mm-hmm. 

Knox
... is, is a San Franciscan. 

Rachel
Yeah. 

Knox
And, uh- 

Rachel
And then you knew his father. 

Knox
I did. I worked with him in the, in the '70s in the San Francisco Examiner. 

Rachel
Yeah, s- 

Knox
And, uh, nice guy, yes. 

Rachel
Eddie's father was a prominent boxing journalist in the city- 

Knox
Yeah, yeah. 

Rachel
... um, from the '50s into, you know- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... well, several decades, and so yeah, Eddie's a Bay Area native. 

Knox
And the, they have a magazine? 

Rachel
Yes. 

Knox
And is it a monthly, quarterly, or? 

Rachel
Quarterly. 

Knox
Quarterly? 

Rachel
Mm-hmm. 

Knox
And you write for it? 

Rachel
Yes, uh, the Noir, Noir City. 

Knox
Oh, Noir City. 

Rachel
And so that's something, if folks can get it, either, definitely encourage people if they're interested, check out the Film Noir Foundation. They are non-profits, so if- 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... and they, they funnel all their contributions into restoring films. There's a very good example, a couple, Woman on the Run that I mentioned, was, uh, that was a film that was just, it was a public domain film, so you could not watch it clearly. You couldn't find a good print. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
Film Noir Foundation restored it, and now it's gorgeous. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
The Man Who Cheated Himself, another film from that same year, shot in and around the city with a great sort of set piece at the end at Fort Point, that was restored by the Film Noir Foundation. 

Knox
What years are those movies? 

Rachel
It's 49, 50. 

Knox
Oh, okay. So, so it's sort, sort of the golden era of noir was in the late '40s- 

Rachel
Mm-hmm. 

Knox
... you would say, early '50s- 

Rachel
Yes. 

Knox
... in San Francisco? 

Rachel
Yeah, for s- 

Knox
Uh-huh. 

Rachel
Yeah, definitely. It's, um, and, oh, so, so yeah, the Fi- the Film Noir Foundation, if you contribute to them- 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... you get a free subscription to a digital version of the magazine that you can pull on a PDF or a tablet. And um, or, uh, through Am- through Amazon you can get print-on-demand copies. 

Knox
Okay. 

Rachel
So you can read an actual physical copy which is such a great way to do. And it's got, I mean, Imogen Smith now is the editor in chief. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
She's based in New York and is a regular contributor to the Criterion Collection. So she's running things. She also writes for the magazine a decent bit, as do I, so it's a great roster of folks. 

Knox
Well, back to San Francisco, um, thank you, um, uh, I'll put all this stuff in the show notes as well. 

Rachel
Oh, yeah. 

Knox
So, so, um- 

Rachel
Thank you. 

Knox
But, um, but you don't think it really came to life until the '40s, or what, I mean what- 

Rachel
That's right. 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
I mean, I think it's, like I said, it was sh- shooting on location was, uh, very uncommon in the '30s. 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
For just a number of practical reasons. 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
Also just so the studios could maintain control. Main contr- maintain control of their players, and it was also much more of a-... particularly for, say, like Warner Brothers and MGM, it's a factory atmosphere, where you- 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... show up to the studio, you get your call sheet for the day. So, for instance, you know, like Humphrey Bogart was a player at Warner Brothers. I think in 1939, he made like 12 movies. 

Knox
Wow. 

Rachel
So, you're just... It's just a grind. You're showing up early, you're just running from picture to picture, and the notion of the auteur going out into the city and having a vision and shooting it is something that, uh, th- folks like Orson Welles started to sort of chink into that armor a bit and work on, to various degrees of success. And so, he's done one of the best examples of, uh, San Francisco noir. But it wasn't, um- 

Knox
Orson Welles? 

Rachel
Yeah, The Lady From Shangheim. 

Knox
I wanna do an episode on that movie. I mean, at some point. 

Rachel
Oh, there's so much there. Uh, th- th- even the whole saga of the films making before they get to San Francisco- 

Knox
Yeah, I would love to. 

Rachel
... is a... its own movie, I think. Yeah. 

Knox
I, I think that was the first... When I first started researching noir movies set in San Francisco, 'cause I thought this would be a great way to, um, help further bring the, you know, the whole... the last era of, of Wild Wild West- 

Rachel
Yeah. 

Knox
... which San Francisco was in the '30s and '40s, uh, would be through the talking about the movies. 

Rachel
Yeah. 

Knox
And, um, so, and that was the one I found and watched, and I thought... And so, that was Orson Welles. Was, was- 

Rachel
Oh, yeah. It was... I mean, and he, he'd been sort of out of Hollywood for a bit when he made that. He had, you know, he had huge success with Citizen Kane and then such a bad experience making The Magnificent Ambersons- 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... his follow-up, which was really, sort of, like this mangled masterpiece that they... The sort of the cliché with Welles was that he would make this great film, but it was over budget, over time. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
They'd take it away from him, re-edit it, and so parts of his vision glimmered through. But- 

Knox
Are there any stories about the, the, The 41 Maltese Falcon that... I mean, that, that stick in your mind? 

Rachel
As far as, like, anecdotes or trivia, I hate to say it, but not really. One interesting thing was that Sidney... This was Sidney Greenstreet's first film. He was a stage actor, and he'd never really gone to Hollywood and done anything, and so he was really nervous. (laughs) 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
And he was, like, holding on to Mary's Astor's... hand during those first few scenes, and he was sweating and shaking and just sort of trying to get into that setting, which is so intimate compared to the stage. But obviously, when you watch the film, there's no indication that he's feeling that inside. His character has such a commanding presence, and I think that that's really helped with the camera work. So many shots of his character, Caspar Gutman, in the film are from below, which just makes him sort of extra large, extra foreboding. And I think just the breezy casualness that he brings to that role, I mean, A, so different than The '31 film. 

Knox
Yes. 

Rachel
Dudley Diggs plays him in the original, and he, he does his own thing, but he's much more cartoonish. And I think Sidney Greenstreet really keeps Caspar Gutman from being a cartoon, which is sort of hard to do based on the way the character's written. And he played off Peter Lorre's character so well that they turned that into sort of a franchise. They were partnered, I think, like five or six more times. 

Knox
Oh, what were some of the movies? 

Rachel
There... Well, there was an interesting follow-up to The Maltese Falcon, Across the Pacific, which was sort of a bit of a reunion. It's got Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor, Peter Lorre, Sidney Greenstreet, and it's just a World War II spy thriller. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
And, but they- 

Knox
What's, what's that called again? 

Rachel
Across the Pacific. And they play very similar characters in it. There's Background to Danger, which I'm trying to... I can't quite remember the plot. There's a very interesting movie, Three Strangers. I think Geraldine Fitzgerald is the third stranger. It's three people, I think, come together and sort of descend on a winning lottery ticket, and it destroys their lives. Um, and, oh, gosh, there's a Victorian one I'm remem- I'm trying to remember the name of. It just escaped me. 

Knox
These are not set in San Francisco- 

Rachel
Mm-mm. 

Knox
... in particular. No. 

Rachel
There... I'm trying to remember. There may be a scene or two in Across the Pacific, because again, it's, it's wartime. They jump around a lot though, I know. It's mostly on sets and on the boat, a boat, I should say. 

Knox
I'm out of questions. (laughs) 

Rachel
(laughs) Um, I'm trying to think if... to, to, to slot it in. One fun cameo in The Maltese Falcon is, um, there's a character that sort of three-quarters of the way through the film storms into Sam Spade's office and mutters, "Maltese Falcon," and collapses dead with the package that does prove to be the, the Falcon itself. That's Walter Huston- 

Knox
Oh, okay. 

Rachel
... John Huston's dad. So, there's a nice little- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... cameo in there. 

Knox
How successful were each of the movies? 

Rachel
'31 I don't think did too much. It was just another... I, I don't know the, the numbers per se- 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... but it was just sort of, you know- 

Knox
Just another movie. 

Rachel
Uh, just another movie, often done, but The '41 version did really well. And it was one of the first times that Bogart had starred in a film rather than playing the heavy, and it really galvanized the public's interest in seeing him more. And so, from there, it was a pretty quick jump to Casablanca and other films that really made his name. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
Um, it was just the year before High Sierra was really his first starring role. And so, that film and The Falcon, he, um... You have to give Pe- uh, excuse me, George Raft credit with making Humphrey Bogart's career. He turned down High Sierra, he turned down Maltese Falcon, and he turned down Casablanca. So, Bogart really made a meal out of those rejects. 

Knox
Wow. Wow. 

Rachel
But it is funny to think of a time when Raft was a bigger star than Bogart. 

Knox
It's hard to... I mean, I... It's hard to wrap my head around that because I- 

Rachel
(laughs) 

Knox
Uh, who did the music for The '41? Do you know? 

Rachel
Yeah, it was, um... Oh, gosh, I have... I actually have his name written down because he's not...... and I think, I gotta say, Adolph Deutsch. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
That, I think is another thing that really makes that film as rich- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... and dynamic as it is. The '31 film has, I don't think any music, aside from, um, things coming incidental from- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... the rooms or... but- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... the '41 film, it adds such gravitas to the scenes, especially the scenes towards the end when he's confronting Bridget O'Shaughnessy and they're having their big blowout at the end about him turning, turning her in. The music just ratchets everything up. I mean, in, in the early to mid-'40s, I think sometimes they go way too crazy with the music, and it's just this character that's kind of shrieking in the background or something like Humoresque with Joan Crawford is a good example of that. But I think in, it, for some movies, it really helps and it adds, um, it adds a dy- dynamism to a movie that I think, as I mentioned, is otherwise a bit airless and kinda claustrophobic. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
So, the movie helps things along. Or excuse me, the music helps things along. 

Knox
Well, let's talk about, uh, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall in Dark Passage. 

Rachel
Oh, yes. 

Knox
(laughs) 

Rachel
Yes. Um, that, that was a project based on a Dave Goodis novel, who's done a lot of other, uh, I mean, most of his stories are crime noir-based. Um, Shoot the Piano Player, and I think that's a film that is, I think, I, I suspect San Francisco was really chosen out of necessity because of its proximity to San Quentin. And so, the plot is Bogart is in San Quentin, he's been convicted of murder, and he escapes. And so, what's really unique about that film is the first 45 minutes or so are all shot first person. You don't see Bogart. You see things from his perspective- 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... as he's escaping, and this mysterious woman somehow tracks him down when he's on the run and says, "Come with me. Get in my car. You're safe." And so, he goes to her lovely apartment in San Francisco and is hiding out, and he gets, uh, plastic surgery to change his appearance to sort of help him in his escape. So, it's not until after the bandages come off that we see it's now Humphrey Bogart, and the action goes on from there. But the city, again, it's, it's that, the verticality of the city, I think, really plays a huge role 'cause there's so many scenes where Bogart's hiding in Bacall's apartment. He sees things down at the street, you know, he, there's a suspicious guy kind of looking around his car, that sort of thing. He's always sort of, um... you can see so much at a glance when you're in San Francisco, but it's also a small enough city where if you jump into a cab, the cab driver kinda recognizes you from the paper. He sort of say, "Oh, hey, hey, what's your deal?" Uh, Tom D'Andrea's the cab driver in that film, and he's got this great little role. So it's, it's still a town that shows in a lot of ways that it's still very neighborhood-y, compared to say New York where the whole point is getting one of a million faces. 

Knox
So, I think I saw that movie a long time ago- 

Rachel
Mm-hmm. 

Knox
... and I just remember the bandages coming off. 

Rachel
Yes. 

Knox
That's all I remember. I forget, did it, did they know each other? 

Rachel
Yes. By that point they were married, so that was- 

Knox
Well, no, no. I know that part. 

Rachel
Oh, for g- (laughs) 

Knox
I meant in the movie. 

Rachel
Oh, oh, oh, yeah. The, the st- 

Knox
What's the story behind her rescuing him? 

Rachel
It's- 

Knox
He, he escapes from San Quentin. 

Rachel
Yes. His... it's a little contrived. I think the, the e- the idea is that her father, Bacall's, in the film, Bacall's character's father was convicted and then I believe either he was executed or died in prison. But he was wrongly convicted. He didn't mur- he didn't do the murder. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
So, she always has a sympathy for wrongly prosecuted men. Although ironically, she also just happens to have a connection to folks that Bogart's character knows in the city that then factor into the plot and who may have actually killed his wife, who he was accused of murdering. So, it's a, it's a definitely like a bit of movie magic going on that she's not just some random lady that doesn't have anything to do with the plot, but it, it does tie in nicely, so she's... then that's I think why through the most of the film you really wonder what her true motivations are, because the story that she gives Bogart- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... seems a little too pat, a little too good to be true, but you have to sort of see how it all plays out. 

Knox
Do you recommend the movie? 

Rachel
Oh, my goodness. It's definitely one of the, uh... it's such a, it's a great film on a lot of levels, because it's also very sweet how Bogart and Bacall are together. I mean, they obviously made a big deal of the fact that they were newly married in real life, but they just have this back and forth snappy patter, this repartee between them that it was very... it wasn't mushy, it wasn't sentimental. It was really just sort of a me- more of a meeting of the minds than anything that was too gooey. And, um, I think that's why they're sort of like a great noir couple. Um, you know, I mean, Key Largo is another sort of crime-based film that they were in together and then Big Sleep- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... around the same time. 

Knox
Was Dark Passage fairly successful? 

Rachel
Um, yes. Yes, it was. 

Knox
They were both big stars by then. 

Rachel
Yeah, I mean, Bacall- 

Knox
What year is that? '47? 

Rachel
'47. So, it was just a few years earlier that they met and Bacall was, gosh, like 19, I wanna say. 

Knox
Yes. 19. 

Rachel
So they made a huge deal of that, that he was about 20 years older and still married at the time. So there was, there was a little bit of that going on, but by the time Dark Passage was out, everything was legal, they were married (laughs). Um, and then, I mean, Bacall's career definitely ended up taking a back seat to Bogart's as- 

Knox
Because she- 

Rachel
... during the history of their marriage 'cause she had, she had, uh, she had a son and a daughter, and definitely wanted to stay home with them during their early years. And it was, was honestly not until after he passed away in '57 that she started to build back up her roles. 

Knox
A little off topic, but did you, did you see the Sopranos episode where Tony Soprano's nephew robs Lauren Bacall's swag? 

Rachel
Oh yes, so great. Yes. The swag bag? 

Knox
(laughs) The swag bag. 

Rachel
Mm-hmm.She has such a great sense of humor. 

Knox
Oh, yeah. 

Rachel
Oh, my gosh, yeah. No, Bacall is just always, e- elegant from day one. 

Knox
Yes. 

Rachel
For, for her entire life, she was really a, a star unlike any other. 

Knox
So, uh, just back to Dark S- 

Rachel
Yeah. 

Knox
... Passage for a moment, i- are there a lot of location shots? I mean, is there- 

Rachel
There are. 

Knox
... hydropulleys? 

Rachel
I mean, I'm... I, I apologize, I'm not great with remembering addresses. 

Knox
Ah. 

Rachel
And so, I know, like, you can visit the apartment building where they shot- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... the film. I mean, it's a mix, you know. They, they show the- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... establishing shot in the city- 

Knox
Right. 

Rachel
... and then they've- 

Knox
Sure. 

Rachel
... got to go to a studio, but... 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
So there, there's also great stuff down by Fort Point- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... right at the bridge. 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
And it, it's all based in sort of your, your San Francisco. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
That classic Nob Hill, Russian Hill- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... everything around Chinatown, sort of up to the bridge. It stays out- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... of the avenues or south of Market. It's all that classic San Francisco that we remember. And Golden Gate Bridge. It, it's just such a... I think, I'm trying to remember who I'm quoting this from. I don't... It's not an original sentiment that, like, outside of the Eiffel Tower, the Golden Gate Bridge is one of the most iconic locators. And so- 

Knox
Sure. 

Rachel
... so many folks wanted to put that in as an icon. 

Knox
Well, I'm gonna have to track it down and, and watch it. It s- sounds great. Um, one last thing before we go. Uh, do you wanna talk about noir movies in general? 

Rachel
Oh, yeah. 

Knox
'Cause I... My, my own experience with a lot of noir movies is, everybody is rather distasteful. 

Rachel
(laughs) 

Knox
Not nice people. 

Rachel
Yeah. 

Knox
I'm, and I'm thinking of, like, uh, you know, The Postman Always Rings Twice. 

Rachel
Yeah. That's a great one. 

Knox
I mean, The Maltese Falcon, Sam Spade's kind of a hero, so you kind of like him and- 

Rachel
Yeah. 

Knox
But, but he's... But, but there are other movies that are just, everybody's on the make. And I mean, is that kind of- 

Rachel
Yeah. When... Spade's a good, um... Actually, I think this... I'm ripping this off from Eddie Muller. I think he said that Sam Spade was sort of the first anti-hero, and I think- 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... that really does go to the heart of when you're either trying to play the game of what's film noir and what isn't, or just in general, trying to get your sense of what this world is, is it's also stories that you end up liking folks you wouldn't normally like otherwise. If you're reading, say, a news account or something a bit more straight, people in illicit industries, but based on the way the story's told, he's your, he's the guy you're going for, he's the guy you're rooting for. And sometimes, it's law and order that are the ones that are really, you know, really the bad guys. But no, I mean, noir, it developed for a lot of practical reasons. Um, in, you know, especially, like, as war was brewing in Europe in the mid-30s, a lot of European filmmakers, Germans particularly, either came over for their own reasons or were fleeing persecution during the war. So Hollywood, during World War II and afterwards, had a huge influx of émigré artists, directors, cinematographers, actors. And they're... They brought still German expressionist style that was a holdover from the silent era and just the experience that everyone had been through during the war. Even straight-up detective stories and things that were around since the 1930s and earlier just made much more sense. Everything had more darkness, depth, and meaning- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... to it- 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... after this sort of harrowing ordeal. And even in straight movies, um, like you said, The Best Years of Our Lives, you know, the Dana Andrews character, he comes back from the war, his wife was cheating on him, he lost his job. There's sort of all... He comes back and things aren't what they were, or the happiness that he had sold himself on to get him through and to survive. You get home and no one cares anymore. You're just one of... You're another guy in a sea of faces. So noir really capitalized on that estrangement that folks had, were starting to have with the American dream, and also a lot of the practical things people had done to survive, either through illicit industries or just people's sense of morality was shaken up by everything that they had gone through. And then, you add in that dark expressionist style with a lot of crazy angles, all the dark shadows that we know about Venetian blinds, all those sorts of, uh, clichéd things that are associated with noir. I mean, that's really definitely an arbiter. And some of that was also for practical reasons. Um, crime films were usually shot on a smaller budget- 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
... than A pictures, and so shadows cover up a lot of set that you don't have money to decorate, so- 

Knox
Ah. Right. 

Rachel
... throw some darkness in, suddenly something looks super cool that would have been cheesy otherwise. 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
And, um, people were just sort of off to the races. I mean, I think there was just dozens... And by 1947, it was really taking over Hollywood, even influencing Westerns, comedies had a darker tone to them. But, um, noir wasn't... It was just sort of... What I'm trying to say is, it wasn't defined as a genre. It, it didn't self-define itself as a movement. Just suddenly, folks started making darker pictures, all these cool stars started cropping up in the genre. Like I mentioned, Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake. 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
And, um, it was the French, of course, in the '50s that started writing about this- 

Knox
Sure. Right. 

Rachel
... as a movement and defining it. Because I think they had, just had enough objectivity to it. And, um, it sort of reached a fever pitch by the mid to late '50s. And there's a number of reasons, I think, why that shifted. Um, when television came in and a lot of folks were... Studios were buying the rights to replay films on TV, it behooved them to actually shoot something in sort of a flat, sharp, black-and-white, gray style without all these huge shadows. 'Cause depending on someone's set, they might not be able to say, see anything of what was going on (laughs). 

Knox
Mm-hmm. 

Rachel
So just out of a sensibility for longevity and to compete with television-... f- film studios were trying to shoot in a flatter style, and also just do things that were more Law & Order-based to kind of compete with some of the programs that were going on. Um, but still, I mean, noir, it's like once... you can't un- you can't put the genie back in the bottle. Once that, I think, that sensibility came out into the world, there were always folks that were... that sort of ran with that sensibility in a variety of ways. I mean, in, excuse me, Orson Welles, again, like, he, he... Lady from Shanghai is a big sort of tree, mark on the tree ring of noir when he did that. But then also, Touch of Evil, sort of the epoch of that era. It came out in 1958. And, um, after that, there was sort of a fallow period until the late '60s. 

Knox
Was this in San Francisco? 

Rachel
No. So, uh, Bordertown. So yeah, like, just south of, uh, south of the border there. 

Knox
Okay. 

Rachel
Um, so yeah, that was definitely sort of the classic era in a nutshell, but I definitely argue that noir is sort of a state of mind- 

Knox
Yeah. 

Rachel
... at that point. And, and it became sort of... It started as a movement, and then I think after, after the mid '60s, it kinda became a genre in itself. Because then folks who grew up watching those movies were making their films. And so rather than just sort of picking up what was in the air and trying to capture something that was a vibe, they were trying to recreate... It became more... Nostalgia got baked into it. So to various degrees, there's all these tree branches and offshoots of where that went, which is a whole podcast in and of itself. 

Knox
Well, that is great. I just... I, I never thought about it all that way. 

Rachel
Oh. 

Knox
And thank you for explaining it to me. 

Rachel
Gosh. Well, and I apologize, I hope I wasn't too vague, too. 

Knox
(laughs) 

Rachel
I mean, certainly something that's... There's so much written about the topic, that, uh, there's a lot of different ways to define it, so that's just sort of personally how I think about it. 

Knox
Well, clearly we have more movies to talk about. 

Rachel
Oh, goodness, yes, yes. 

Knox
Yes, so, um, I think we can say, uh, goodbye for now. 

Rachel
Yeah. 

Knox
Thank you so much, Rachel- 

Rachel
Thank you, yes. 

Knox
... for joining us, and I will, you know... Check the show notes because I'm gonna have links to Rachel's, uh, stuff and, uh, everything. So, uh, thanks again so much for, uh, uh, coming and, uh, um, until next time, Rachel. 

Rachel
Yes, thank you guys. Yeah, happy watching. I think hopefully we've, uh, talked about some stuff folks are gonna wanna check out. 

Knox
I hope so. I think so. 

Rachel
(laughs) 

Knox
Okay, thanks. (train crossing bells ringing) (slow instrumental music) The Secret History of Frisco is a listener-supported podcast. Main episodes will always be free. Our website is www.thesecrethistoryoffrisco.com. Please join us on Patreon at www.patreon.com/frisco. Visit the website for show notes, references and bibliographies. Please take advantage of our free membership tier on Patreon. Paid tier members starting at as little as $1 a month will receive ad-free and bonus episodes and other perks of membership. If you enjoy the podcast, please tell your friends about it, especially those who enjoy San Francisco or true crime history. Word of mouth is the absolute best means of promotion for any creative endeavor in this world of algorithms and the ceaseless barrage of ads, notifications, and appeals on every digital platform. If you are aware of some particular aspect of San Francisco history in the '30s and '40s you would like me to research, or have a story to tell, please get in touch with me. If you are an expert in some aspect of that same era and would like to share that expertise on the podcast, also please let me know. Once again, I'm your host, Knox Bronson. Thank you for listening. Until next time, please get a little crazy, and call it frisco. (train crossing bells ringing) (slow instrumental music)