Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

FirstWitch A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

Catangro After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

Darin One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

PimpinAinttEasy A melancholic drama with elements of a gangster heist film. If you're looking for a procedural heist flick like CRISS CROSS, forget about this movie. This is a character study of ageing gangster mad dog roy earle (bogart) and an account of his life after he is released from jail. roy wants to settle down in an Indiana farm. There are even two girls vying for his attention. All he has to do is make one last heist, which he owes to his old boss. A rather schmaltzy sub plot about a handicapped girl takes something out of the film. It was not the best way to show roy's bourgeoisie aspirations. I dont think the makers realized the film's full potential. But the relationship between roy and the marie (ida lupino), the damsel in distress is one of the film's highlights.Ida Lupino is not the most beautiful actress of the 1940s and 50s. But she is that special woman who most men end up longing for if she were in a room full of beautiful bimbos. There is something very bewitching about her. This must be one of Bogart's best performances as mad dog earle, tough on the outside, but inside he longs for a normal life on a farm.I liked the grand vistas which was the backdrop for the final car chase.(7.5/10)

JPA.CA This film shows Humphrey Bogart's incredible versatility and natural talent.The story and his acting as a gangster are so believable and Ida Lupino was a perfect match. Her performance was so great that in my mind she is forever typecast in the role.How many times can you say you enjoyed every minute of a movie? I'd put a small handful in that category, all of which star Humphrey Bogart or John Wayne.This one is even available in digital HD! Thanks Warner Brothers - score huge!

dougdoepke Bank-robber Roy Earle (Bogart) may be outside the law, but he's a lot more sympathetic than those functionaries carrying out the law. Of course, they get him in the end, just as the production code of the day said they must. In the meantime, however, we're treated to a zeitgeist glimpse of the Depression Era, as captured by screenwriters John Huston and W.R. Burnett. Together they underscore Earle's connection to ordinary folks, whether passing time with a dirt farmer, befriending a penniless crippled girl, or shooting the breeze with her folksy father. Clearly he's an extention of them, and when he 'breaks free' at movie's end, we know audiences of the day break free of their own oppressive conditions, if only for a moment. This is a milestone Bogart movie, the one that catapulted him onto the Hollywood A-list as the soft-hearted tough guy that would become his signature. Good as he is -- and looking like John Dillinger in a prison haircut -- I like Ida Lupino's soulful gun moll even better. Together, she and Sylvia Sydney defined the downtrodden, yet gutsy, lower class woman of the time. Here she clings to outlaw Earle and their ugly mutt like it's her last shot at life. And it probably is, the script discreetly implying she's been passed from man to man for years. So at film's end, when, ennobled by true love, her eyes uplift and a beatific glow calls forth, we know that a dignity is restored and a past transcended -- and the "High" in High Sierra comes to stand for a lot more than hard-scrabble mountaintop.

jjnxn-1 Excellent crime drama/early film noir. This was the first in Bogey's 1-2- 3 punch, followed by The Maltese Falcon then Casablanca, that took him from resident Warners tough guy villain to one of the studio's leading romantic stars. He plays Roy "Mad Dog" Earle perfectly showing him as ruthless when necessary but with a core of decency that hasn't been ruined by years of hard knocks. Matching him every step of the way is the always outstanding Ida Lupino in one of her best portrayals. Her Marie is a classic hard luck case, tough on the outside but vulnerable underneath. She and Bogart are an ideal match, a shame then that this was there last film together and the only one where they were paired as equals. The rest of the cast is terrific in support, including Joan Leslie, a variable actress but well used here as a seemingly nice girl who is exposed as a thoughtless, shallow grabber. Walsh's direction is aces as well with wonderful use of shadows and spaces to convey the isolation of the characters.