Noir Festival to Feature Q&A With Son of Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall

Film noir fans might want to clear their calendars.

The Noir City Festival has unveiled its lineup, with The Egyptian Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard presenting three weeks of programming. The lineup includes a rare Q&A with Stephen Bogart, the son of film legends Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. He’ll take the stage after a screening of his parents’ 1947 film Dark Passage. The Q&A will be followed by the Los Angeles premiere of This Last Lonely Place, produced by the Humphrey Bogart Estate’s Santana Films. 

The American Cinematheque is putting on the fest in collaboration with the Film Noir Foundation. It runs April 3-19.

The full lineup is below. It includes a number of films not available on home video.

Friday, April 3 – 7:30 PM                                                            

Co-presented by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association

Opening Night Double Feature: Brand-New 35mm Restoration! 

WOMAN ON THE RUN, 1950, Fidelity Pictures, 77 min. Dir. Norman Foster. San Franciscan Frank Johnson disappears after witnessing a gangland killing. Police think his wife (Ann Sheridan) will lead them to her husband, but she never wants to see him again. Enter newspaperman Danny Leggett (Dennis O’Keefe), who charms Mrs. Johnson with stunning results. Restored by the Film Noir Foundation in conjunction with UCLA Film & Television Archive. Special thanks to the British Film Institute. Restoration funding provided by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association through the Film Noir Foundation.

THE UNFAITHFUL, 1947, Warner Bros., 109 min. Dir. Vincent Sherman. Ann Sheridan plays a woman whose sexual indiscretion leads to murder and a tangled web of deceit. Legendary noir scribe David Goodis applies his typically thorny plotting to this reimagining of W. Somerset Maugham’s The Letter, transposed to post-WWII Los Angeles. Featuring Zachary Scott, Lew Ayres and Eve Arden. Introduction by Eddie Muller of the Film Noir Foundation.

Saturday, April 4 – 5:00 PM                                                       

Co-presented by the Humphrey Bogart Estate

Double Feature

DARK PASSAGE, 1947, Warner Bros., 106 min. In this third collaboration between Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, Bogie plays a man wrongly accused of murdering his wife, who breaks out of jail to find the killer; Bacall is the woman who helps him hide out and solve the mystery. Working from David Goodis’ bleak crime novel, director Delmer Daves employs an innovative subjective camera to adopt Bogart’s point of view and creates a noir classic.

THIS LAST LONELY PLACE, 2014, Santana Productions, 85 min. Dir. Steve Anderson. A noir-drenched drive through the dark streets and back alleys of Los Angeles. Cabbie Sam Taylor is an Iraq war vet who picks up a shady Beverly Hills investment banker who is obviously running from something. When they pick up Frank’s mistress at the Chateau Marmont, things quickly spiral from bad to worse. As the long night progresses, deceits come to light … and blood is spilled. Introduction by Eddie Muller of the Film Noir Foundation. Discussion between films with Stephen Bogart and THIS LAST LONELY PLACE director Steve Anderson, followed by a cocktail reception courtesy of Humphrey Bogart’s Real English Gin.

Sunday, April 5 – 7:30 PM                                                         

British Marriage Noir Double Feature

THE HIDDEN ROOM (aka OBSESSION), 1949, Eagle-Lion Films, 96 min. British psychologist Clive Riordan (Robert Newton), fed up with his wife’s philandering, makes her latest lover disappear in a deviously devised “perfect crime.” Made in England by the blacklisted Edward Dmytryk, THE HIDDEN ROOM is an unjustly neglected masterpiece, packed with wit and suspense. Print courtesy of the British Film Institute.

THE SLEEPING TIGER, 1954, Astor Pictures, 89 min. Dir. Joseph Losey. Psychologist Clive Esmond (Alexander Knox) boards a criminal youth (Dirk Bogarde) in his home, in order to test his methods of behavior modification through psychoanalysis. Just wait until the doctor’s wife (Alexis Smith) gets her hands on the young stud. Losey’s first British-made film is an early example of what would become his métier – characters engaged in wicked sex and class warfare. Print courtesy of the British Film Institute.  Introduction by Eddie Muller of the Film Noir Foundation.

Thursday, April 9 – 7:30 PM                                                

More Marriage Noir! Double Feature

THE SUSPECT, 1944, Universal, 85 min. Dir. Robert Siodmak. Timid tobacconist Charles Laughton develops a friendship with poor young Ella Raines, igniting his wife’s jealousy. Despite the Edwardian-era decorum, this is one of Siodmak’s best noirs, with Laughton’s memorable portrait of a lonely man who will do anything to protect the unexpected joy he’s found too late in his life.

LADIES IN RETIREMENT, 1941, Sony Repertory, 91 min. Dir. Charles Vidor. Ida Lupino scores as a timid housekeeper who becomes enmeshed in murder and madness. Ida tends to an aged actress (Isobel Elsom) and persuades her to take in her two eccentric sisters (Elsa Lanchester and Edith Barrett). All bets are off when a mysterious stranger (future Lupino spouse Louis Hayward) arrives to stir the pot further. Introduction by Alan Rode of the Film Noir Foundation.

Friday, April 10 – 7:30 PM                                                     

Cornell Woolrich Double Feature: Brand New 35mm Restoration!

THE CHASE, 1946, 86 min. Dir. Arthur Ripley. Scripted by Philip Yordan, from the novel The Black Path of Fear by Cornell Woolrich. Robert Cummings plays a drifter hired as a chauffeur by two Florida crooks (Steve Cochran and Peter Lorre). He falls for Cochran’s wife (Michelle Morgan) with dire, unpredictable results. As Lynch-ian as movies got in the 1940s. 35mm restored print courtesy of the UCLA Film & Television Archive. Restoration funding provided by The Film Foundation and the Franco-American Cultural Fund.

THE LEOPARD MAN, 1943, Warner Bros., 66 min. Dir. Jacques Tourneur. This seminal adaptation of Cornell Woolrich’s novel Black Alibi is brilliantly realized by Tourneur and legendary producer Val Lewton. Dennis O’Keefe hires a supposedly tame leopard to hype his girlfriend’s nightclub act. The felonious feline escapes as a wave of murderous terror envelops a small New Mexico town. Introduction by Alan Rode of the Film Noir Foundation.

Saturday, April 11 – 7:30 PM                                                 

THE UNDERWORLD STORY, 1950, Warner Bros., 90 min. Another unjustly neglected noir by director Cy Enfield, in which Dan Duryea plays a cynical reporter who digs dangerously close to a corrupt publisher’s family secrets. Costarring Herbert Marshall, Gale Storm and Howard da Silva, and featuring dazzling cinematography by the great Stanley Cortez. New 35mm print courtesy of the Film Noir Foundation collection at the UCLA Film & Television Archive.

ABANDONED, 1949, Universal, 78 min. Dir. Joseph M. Newman. Gale Storm plays a naive young woman who’s come to Los Angeles in search of her missing sister. Shunned by the police, she’s assisted by an intrepid reporter (Dennis O’Keefe), who smells a story when he gets wind of an underground racket in black-market babies. Featuring Raymond Burr and Mike Mazurki, and the screen debut of future star Jeff Chandler. NOT ON DVD Introduction by Alan Rode of the Film Noir Foundation.

Sunday, April 12 – 7:30 PM                                                        

Barbara Stanwyck Double Feature

WITNESS TO MURDER, 1954, Park Circus/UA, 83 min. Dir. Roy Rowland. In this distaff version of REAR WINDOW (released before the Hitchcock classic), Barbara Stanwyck sees neighbor George Sanders strangle a victim in his swanky digs. It’s the word of a single woman against that of a renowned author (and closet Nazi) – so guess who the LAPD believes? Featuring the chiaroscuro camerawork of noir shadow-meister John Alton.

JEOPARDY, 1953, Warner Bros., 69 min. Dir. John Sturges. Barbara Stanwyck and Barry Sullivan play a vacationing couple whose fishing trip to Baja turns into a nightmare when the husband is trapped under a rotting pier with the tide rising. Their only hope is a fugitive killer (Ralph Meeker), whose aid comes at a high cost for the terrified, if resourceful, wife. Introduction by Alan Rode of the Film Noir Foundation.

Wednesday, April 15 – 7:30 PM                                                

Jacques Tourneur Double Feature

CIRCLE OF DANGER, 1951, Warner Bros., 86 min. This suspenseful British-made adaptation of Philip MacDonald’s novel is expertly helmed by Jacques Tourneur and produced with Hitchcockian aplomb by Joan Harrison. Ray Milland journeys to Scotland to unravel the truth of his brother’s strange death as a commando during World War II.

BERLIN EXPRESS, 1948, Warner Bros., 87 min. Dir. Jacques Tourneur. Robert Ryan, Merle Oberon and Paul Lukas head an international cast in the first Hollywood film shot on location in Allied-occupied postwar Germany. A cadre of allied officials, headed by train to a peace conference, suddenly become detectives when Germany’s most outspoken peace activist goes missing. Introduction by Eddie Muller of the Film Noir Foundation.

Thursday, April 16 – 7:30 PM                                                  

Dorothy Hughes Double Feature

RIDE THE PINK HORSE, 1947, Universal, 101 min. In this adaptation of the novel by Dorothy B. Hughes, a surly vet (director/actor Robert Montgomery) ventures into a New Mexico resort town during fiesta to settle a score with a vacationing mobster. A strange film that plays as much like a Japanese samurai movie as film noir. With Thomas Gomez, Wanda Hendrix and Andrea King.

THE FALLEN SPARROW, 1943, Warner Bros., 94 min. Dir. Richard Wallace. Scripted by Warren Duff, from the novel by Dorothy B. Hughes. This convoluted but compelling story, told in creepy Val Lewton style, stars John Garfield as a Spanish Civil War veteran being driven crazy by stateside fascists. Is Maureen O’Hara his only ally … or his enemy? Shot by RKO’s in-house noir master, Nicholas Musuraca. Introduction by Eddie Muller of the Film Noir Foundation.

Friday, April 17 – 7:30 PM                                                       

Argentine Noir Triple Feature: New Print!

EL VAMPIRO NEGRO (THE BLACK VAMPIRE), 1953, Argentine Sono Films, 90 min. Dir. Román Viñoly. This reimagining of Fritz Lang’s M stars Olga Zubarry, Argentina’s answer to Marilyn Monroe, as a chanteuse and single mother who is the sole eyewitness to the child killer stalking the streets of Buenos Aires. Will her daughter be the next victim? In Spanish with English subtitles. New 35mm print courtesy of the Film Noir Foundation collection at the UCLA Film & Television Archive.

U.S. Premiere! New Prints!

NO ABRAS NUNCA ESA PUERTA (NEVER OPEN THAT DOOR) and SI MUERO ANTES DE DESPERTAR (IF I DIE BEFORE I WAKE), 1952, Argentine Estudios San Miguel, 151 min. Dir. Carlos Hugo Christensen. This stunning anthology film adapted from the short stories of noir master Cornell Woolrich was originally conceived by its makers as a single film, but the titles were released separately. Tonight marks the first time they have been screened in a single, unified presentation. In Spanish with English subtitles. New 35mm prints courtesy of the Film Noir Foundation collection at the UCLA Film & Television Archive. NONE AVAILABLE ON DVD Introduction by Eddie Muller of the Film Noir Foundation.

Saturday, April 18 – 7:00 PM                                                    

FILM NOIR PARTY! Join us for a screening of THE GUILTY, followed by martinis, casino games, dancing, photo ops and other noir activities in our Courtyard. Music by the Dean Mora Swingtet!

Brand New 35mm Restoration!

THE GUILTY, 1947, Monogram Pictures, 71 min. Dir. John Reinhardt. Two war buddies (Don Castle and Wally Cassel) fall for twin sisters (both played by Bonita Granville). When one sister turns up dead, the boys are dogged by a suspicious police inspector (Regis Toomey). Working with only three sets and virtually no budget, director Reinhardt and DP Henry Sharp evoke the dreadful, dead-of-night ambiance that was the domain of prolific noir scribe Cornell Woolrich. 35mm restored print courtesy of the UCLA Film & Television Archive. Restoration funding provided by the Film Noir Foundation. NOT ON DVD. Introduction by Eddie Muller of the Film Noir Foundation. 

Sunday, April 19 – 5:00 PM                                                      

Proto-Noir Marathon!

THE NINTH GUEST, 1934, Sony Repertory, 65 min. Dir. Roy William Neill. A spine-tingling “locked-room” mystery about eight guests invited to spend a night in a penthouse apartment, where they are compelled by a disembodied host to deduce the identity of the ninth guest by morning … or else! This rare horror-mystery stars Donald Cook, Genevieve Tobin and Vince Barnett. NOT ON DVD

LET US LIVE, 1939, Sony Repertory, 68 min. Dir. John Brahm. Innocent taxi drivers Henry Fonda and Alan Baxter are railroaded to the death house for a robbery-homicide in this compelling proto-noir. An early standout performance by Fonda receives stellar support from co-star Maureen O’Sullivan, along with a well-crafted script (by Anthony Veiller and Allen Rivkin) and photography (Lucien Ballard).

HEAT LIGHTNING, 1934, Warner Bros., 63 min. Dir. Mervyn LeRoy. A startling, existential pre-Code gem with a feminist slant, about two sisters (Ann Dvorak and Aline MacMahon) who run a Mojave Desert filling station/tourist stop and become trapped by their past and a pair of gunmen (Preston Foster and Lyle Talbot) on the lam. This fast-paced, noir-stained predecessor to THE PETRIFIED FOREST was adapted from a George Abbott play and still packs a wallop.

SAFE IN HELL, 1931, Warner Bros., 73 min. Dir. William A. Wellman. In this lurid pre-Code thriller, New Orleans prostitute Dorothy MacKaill is accused of murdering the pimp who turned her out. To avoid extradition, she is smuggled to a wayward Caribbean isle by her boyfriend (Donald Cook) and ends up the object of lust by a group of international criminals inhabiting a sleazy seaside hotel. Introduction by Eddie Muller and Alan Rode of the Film Noir Foundation.