In 1941, a full year before the Glass Key was released, John Huston’s adaptation of another Dashiell Hammett novel considerably altered the cinematic tradition forever. His combination of a hard boiled detective story with visual cues taken from German expressionism (shadows, smoke filled rooms, and an overall attention towards details which greatly complement black and white cinematography) resulted in The Maltese Falcon. Each year we encounter a handful of movies that owe it all to these visual cues.
Filmmaking, and Hollywood especially is a cannibalistic system that thrives off of remaking what has worked so well in the past. This is why I thought it strange that The Glass Key has few noirish elements, and plays out much more like the gangster movies that were popularized a decade earlier. For example, when Ed walks into the Henry mansion, you know from that point on that he is definitely attracted to Janet. A romantic score playsas they “cut eyes” at each other. The ambiguity that made Hammet’s novel so intriguing is lost in order to placate the audience. When I read in the novel that Ned had a big smile on his face, I imagined a friendly expression, but with evidence that menace was directly behind that grin. It was something that I could picture in his eyes. I do not see that in Ed.
Beaumont’s ambitious escape from Nick’s henchmen brought to mind earlier films of Cagney and Edward G. Robinson. The lone hero, running around and causing trouble for others. Ned Beaumont, to me, does not seem like a runner. And by the point he found the razorblade in the medicine cabinet, I had seen enough to know that they would omit his suicide attempt.
This adaptation is one that I can admire and have fun discussing in the class and on here, but it is not one that I can stand behind, or will come back to a decade later. I do not mean to sound like a purist by any means, for every viewing experience, no matter what the movie is, really helps enhance the critical procedure. I look forward to finishing The Glass Key tomorrow