Key Largo

The twin forces of hurricane-strength winds and Johnny Rocco’s gang of thugs descend on a quaint, seaside hotel in John Huston’s Key Largo, testing the courage and fortitude of visiting veteran Frank McCloud (Humphrey Bogart) who rises to the challenge of protecting innkeeper James Temple (Lionel Barrymore) and his beautiful daughter Nora (Lauren Bacall). Of all the nasty gangsters Edward G. Robinson played, Johnny Rocco just might be the most rotten: the scene in which he forces his alcoholic ex-moll Gay (Claire Trevor) to sing — poorly — for a drink, and then further humiliates her by withholding it, seems almost crueler than if he had knocked her out. (Trevor, who upstages Bacall throughout the film, won a well-deserved Oscar for her performance). Despite his nastiness, Rocco is frightened by the storm (McCloud suggests he try to shoot it) which Huston renders effectively through blackouts, roaring winds, glasses shattering, lamps rattling, all adding a new layer of vulnerability for the trapped occupants. Freund’s cinematography makes the most of the thunderous malaise, chiaroscuro compositions mounting in the second half to enhance the glow of doom that follows McCloud out to sea.