Dark Passage (1947)

Falling into the film noir genre, Dark Passage, starring the then newly married Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, revolves around a wrongly accused escaped convict who finds comfort and assistance in the beautiful Bacall while trying to clear his name. What is most interesting about this particular film is that the first half of it takes place almost entirely from the viewpoint of the convict (Bogart). You don't see his face until after he's had illegal facial surgery to alter his looks.

Once Bogart actually appears on film the story falls into a great number of clichés, convenient coincidences and the most consecutive series of accidental deaths all pointing to the same innocent convict... well, it's a little much to take.

For example, Bogart's character says he didn't kill his wife (the reason for his incarceration). He visits his friend, who ends up dead, Bogart's fingerprints on the murder weapon (a trumpet), but he didn't do it. He then confronts the real murderer behind all of the deaths (Agnes Moorehead) only to have her accidentally fall out of the window and to her death on the street below, again with all real evidence pointing to Bogart.

What a bad week!

Tack on a quite simplistic, happy ending and what started out as one of the most inventive film noir films in cinematic history ends up being a complete mess. Too bad.