To Have And Have Not (DVD)

US Import

Help the Free French? Not world-weary Harry Morgan (Humphrey Bogart). But he changes his mind when a sultry siren named Marie asks, "Anybody got a match?" That red-hot match is Bogart and 19-year-old Lauren Bacall in her acting debut. Full of intrigue and racy banter (certain whistling instructions), this thriller excites further interest for what it has and has not. Cannily directed by Howard Hawks and smartly written by William Faulkner and Jules Furthman, it doesn't have much similarity to Ernest Hemingway's novel. And it strongly resembles Casablanca: French resistance fighters, a bluesy piano man (Hoagy Carmichael) and a Martinique bar like Rick's Cafe America in. But foremost, it has Bogart and Bacall, carrying on with a passion that smolders from the tips of their cigarettes clear through to their souls.