AFI Top 100, #30: "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" (1948)

Movie Stats:
Released 1948 (USA)
American, in English (lots of Spanish, much of it non-translated)
Director - John Huston
Stars - Humphrey Bogart, Walter Huston, Tim Holt

Plot Summary:
Down on his luck in Mexico, Dobbs (Bogart) teams up with fellow Americans Howard (Huston) and Curtin (Holt) in a quest for gold.

Warnings:
Violence.

Bad Stuff:
I can’t say that I’ve ever considered the name “Bogart” to be synonymous with “overacting” before, but I thought he chewed a lot of scenery here.

I didn’t find the character of Huston particularly believable. His reaction to everything was too perfect. He was an emotional Mary Sue.

Too long/too much arguing. The point was belabored.

Good Stuff:
The theme of the film was interesting to me. It was a nice exploration of desperation and greed, and how those things can lead to madness. While I thought that Bogart overplayed it, I enjoyed watching his character slowly lose his mind.

I really liked Curtin. If Howard was the brains of the operation, and Bogart the (wild) emotion, Curtin was the heart, strong but never corrupted. Holt’s performance was solid. His WTF facial expression toward the end, while Howard was laughing over their change in fortune, was highly amusing.

I liked the stark, desert setting.

The Verdict:
I liked it. It is another one of those movies that’s not ridiculously long (a little over two hours) but feels longer, mostly because, in the middle, it gets repetitious. “Oh, they’re arguing again,” I would think. “Dobbs is acting crazy. Someone wants to steal their gold,” etc. So it could have been a little shorter. I thought the beginning in Tampico, which depicts the mens’ struggle to survive day-to-day, and the end, where we see their respective fates, were well done. Some performances were so-so, while others were quite good. Overall, I thought it was pretty good.

I give it 3.75 stars.