Don't Make a Scene: The Maltese Falcon

The Story: I have a friend (Hey, Walter) who would always have an ace in the hole when playing trivia games. It was: "What's the last line of The Maltese Falcon?" The answerer would confidently say: "The stuff dreams are made of." Of course.

But, they'd be wrong. The last line of The Maltese Falcon is "Huh?" spoken by Ward Bond's Sgt. Polhaus at detective Sam Spade's rare attempt of poetic irony.* "Huh?" Exactly. Think you know movies? "Huh."

But, that's an amusing aside.

The classic finale where tough-guy detective Sam Spade (who doesn't like guns despite the movie poster) does the right thing but betrays the woman he's working for and had a romantic tryst with was always a part of the story, which started as a novel by Dashiell Hammett. Falcon had been filmed by the Warner Studio twice before, but—owing to Hammett's previous movie success being the larky adaptation of his "The Thin Man"—it had been treated broadly and with more of a winking joviality with the audience.

But, Falcon was a different story from "The Thin Man", and when writer John Huston decided to move to directing, he wanted this Warner property because 1) it was available and 2) the studio had already botched it up twice. The studio took the risk because they'd already filmed it twice before and as long as Huston kept the costs down, there was relatively little risk. 

They didn't count on it becoming a classic and one of the studios' proudest achievements.

So good, in fact, that it never had to be remade again.

It spawned a genre called "film noir," where the inky blacks of the urban night-time seemed to be suffused with something more than just dark, mixed with some German expressionism, a dash of neo-realism, and with a whiff of the pulp-paper of crime fiction writers who took the lessons of the Depression and the War and leeched the good intentions and happy endings of escapism and hammered home a cynical world-view.

It threw out the happy ending where the guy gets the girl and substituted where the guy gets the girl hanged. She's a murderer and he knows it and he does the right thing, despite that it might feel wrong, and it spells it out in a lengthy speech that goes into the fine detail about two people who have been stringing each other along for the entire length of the movie and why there would be no reason, no reason at all that any other decision is impossible. This is the long-hand that made the short-hand of subsequent noir's possible—the potential of blackmail and murder that might come in the future...if there is a future.

I took pains on this one to get the dialog right. What ended up on the screen moves away from the Huston screenplay (that you can find online) and even from transcripts on other sites. There's a complicated rhythm to the language which feels better than what's on the page, and it was probably refined on the shooting stage—which necessitated adding words rather than cutting them.

But, I did keep Huston's directions and descriptions from the screenplay and put them in, because I found them fascinating. They feel like pulp writing of a definite purple tinge. But the other thing that's interesting is that Huston's screenplay directions read like they're for a love scene. It feels perverse, but it is absolutely right, given the high dudgeon of emotion going on in the scene. Huston's career is full of muted love scenes, the kind you don't hear strings behind, but here the passion is high, but it doesn't end in a clinch, unless it's the snapping shut of hand-cuffs.

The Set-Up: Detective Sam Spade (Humphrey Bogart) is up to his sweating neck in a case that's had lots of consequences and lots of bodies fallen by the way-side, including that of his business partner, Miles Archer. What's turned from a missing persons case to a smuggling matter with mythic proportions has had a colorful cast of characters, but, now, they've all left the party, the object they've coveted proving to be a fake, leaving Spade with the person who first brought the matter...or A matter...to his attention, Brigid O'Shaunessy (Mary Astor), formerly Miss Wonderly, formerly Miss LeBlanc, formerly...who knows? She's pretty, but the circumstances aren't.

Action.

122.  CLOSE SHOT - SPADE AT TELEPHONE

Spade takes the receiver off the hook and dials a number. Brigid watches him, a slight frown on her face.

SAM SPADE: Hello. Sergeant Polhaus there? Yeah. Put him on. This is Sam Spade.

(He stares into space, waiting, then:)

SPADE: Hello. Tom? Now, listen. I've got something for you. Here it is: Jacoby and Thursby were killed by a kid named Wilmer Cook. Yeah. 

SPADE: He's about twenty years old, five-foot-six wearing a gray overcoat. 

SPADE: He's working for a man named Kasper Gutman. 

SPADE: You can't miss Gutman. He must weigh three hundred pounds. That fellow Cairo's in with him, too. 

SPADE: They just left for the Alexandria Hotel. But you'll have to move fast. They're blowing town.  Now watch yourself when you go up against the kid. Yes, that's right. Very. Well, good luck, Tom.

Spade slowly replaces the receiver on the prong. He fills his chest with air and exhales. His eyes are glittering between narrowed lids. He turns, takes three swift steps toward Brigid O'Shaughnessy. The girl, startled by the suddenness of his approach, lets her breath out in a little gasp. Spade, face to face with Brigid, looks at her hard of jaw and eye.

SPADE: They'll talk when they're nailed about us. We're sitting on dynamite.

SPADE: We've only got minutes to get set for the police. Now give me all of it fast! When you first came to my office, why did you want Thursby shadowed? 

BRIGID O'SHAUNESSY: I told you, Sam! I thought he was betraying me. I wanted to find out. 

SPADE: That's a lie! You had Thursby hooked and you knew it and you wanted to kill him before Jacoby came with the loot so you wouldn't have to split it with him. Isn't that so?

SPADE: What was your scheme?
BRIGID: I thought if he knew someone was following him, he'd be frightened into going away. 

SPADE: Miles wasn't clumsy enough to be spotted the first night. You told Thursby he was being followed. 

BRIGID: I told him. 

BRIGID: I told him. 

BRIGID: Yes, but please believe me, Sam. I wouldn't have told him if I thought Floyd would kill him. 

SPADE: If you thought he wouldn't kill Miles, you were right, angel. Miles hadn't many brains, but he'd had too many years experience as a detective to be caught like that, by a man he was shadowing up a blind alley with his gun in his hip and his overcoat buttoned.
(he takes his hand away from her shoulder, looks at her for a long moment, then:)

SPADE: But he'd have gone up there with you, angel. He was just dumb enough for that. He'd have looked you up and down and licked his lips and gone...grinning from ear to ear. 

SPADE: Then you could have stood as close to him as you liked in the dark and put a hole through him with a gun you got from Thursby that evening. -
Brigid shrinks back from him until the edge of the table stops her.
BRIGID: Don't, Sam! Don't say that!
SPADE: Stop it! The police'll be here any minute! Now talk!

BRIGID: Oh, why do you accuse me...
SPADE: This isn't the time for that schoolgirl act! We're both of us sitting under the gallows! 
He grasps her wrists forcing her to stand up straight in front of him. Her face becomes suddenly haggard.

SPADE: Now, why did you shoot Miles?
BRIGID: (voice hushed and troubled)I didn't mean to at first, really, I didn't. But when I found out that Floyd couldn't be frightened... 

BRIGID: Oh, I can't look at you and tell you this!
(she starts to sob, clings to him) 

SPADE: You thought Thursby would tackle Miles and one or the other of them would go down. If Thursby was killed, you were rid of him. If it was Miles, you'd see that Thursby was caught and sent up for it. Isn't that right? -
(She nods) 
BRIGID: Something like that. 

SPADE: When you found that Thursby wasn't going to tackle him...you borrowed his gun and did it yourself, right?  And when you heard Thursby was shot, you knew Gutman was in town! You knew you needed another protector, somebody to fill Thursby's boots, so you came back to me.

She puts her hands around the back of his neck pushing his head down until his mouth all but touches hers.

BRIGID: Yes! No, sweetheart, it wasn't only that! I'd have come back to you sooner or later. From the very first instant I saw you, I knew. 

He puts his arms around her holding her tight to him.

SPADE: Well...if you get a good break, you'll be out of Tehachapi in years...

SPADE: ...and you can come back to me then. 
She draws away from him slightly, throws her head far back to stare up at him, uncomprehending.

SPADE: I hope they don't hang you, precious, by that sweet neck. - He puts his hand up and caresses her throat. In an instant she is out of his arms back against the table crouching, both hands spread over her throat. Her face is wild-eyed, haggard. Her mouth opens and closes. 

BRIGID: You're not... (she can get no other words out) - 
Spade's face is damp with sweat now. His mouth smiles and there are smile wrinkles around his glittering eyes.
SPADE: Yes, angel, I'm gonna send you over. 

SPADE: The chances are you'll get off with life. That means if you're a good girl, you'll be out in twenty years. I'll be waiting for you. 

SPADE: If they hang you, I'll always remember you.
Brigid drops her hands, stands erect. Her face becomes smooth and untroubled except for the faintest of dubious glints in her eyes. She smiles back at him. 

BRIGID: Don't, Sam! 

BRIGID:  Don't say that, even in fun! 

BRIGID: I was frightened for a minute. I really thought... You do such wild and unpredictable things.
She breaks off, thrusts her head forward and stares deep into his eyes. The flesh around her mouth shivers and fear comes back into her eyes. She puts her hand to her throat again. Spade laughs. His laugh is a croak. 

SPADE: Now, don't be silly. You're taking the fall.

BRIGID: You've been playing with me...just pretending you cared to trap me like this. You didn't care at all! You don't love me!
The muscles holding his smile stand out like walls.

SPADE: I won't play the sap for you! 

BRIGID: You know it's not like that! 

SPADE: You never played square with me for half an hour at a stretch since I've known you!
Brigid blinks her tears away, takes a few steps backward, stands looking at him, straight and proud. 

BRIGID: You know down deep in your heart that in spite of anything I've done, I love you.
He puts his hand back on her shoulders, the hand shakes and jerks. 

SPADE: I don't care who loves who! I won't play the sap for you! I won't walk in Thursby's, and I don't know how many others' footsteps! 

SPADE: You killed Miles and you're going over for it.
She takes his hand from her shoulder, holds it close to her face. 

BRIGID: How can you do this to me, Sam? Surely, Mr. Archer wasn't as much to you as...

He is no longer smiling. He pulls his hand away from her. His wet face is set hard and deeply lined. His eyes burn madly. 

SPADE: Listen. 

SPADE: This won't do any good. You'll never understand me, but I'll try once and then give it up. 

SPADE: When a man's partner is killed, he's supposed to do something. It makes no difference what you thought of him. He was your partner, and you're supposed to do something about it...

SPADE: ...and it happens we're in the detective business. Well, when one of your organization gets killed, it's...it's bad business to let the killer get away with it...bad all around, bad for every detective everywhere. 

BRIGID: You don't expect me to think that these things you're saying are sufficient reasons for sending me... 

SPADE: Wait'll I'm through. Then, you can talk. 

SPADE: I've no earthly reason to think I can trust you and if I do this and get away with it, you'll have something on me that you can use whenever you want to. 

SPADE: Since I've got something on you I couldn't be sure that you wouldn't put a hole in me someday. 

SPADE: All those are on one side. Maybe some of them are unimportant. I won't argue about that. 

SPADE: But look at the number of them. What have we got on the other side? 

SPADE: All we've got is that maybe you love me and maybe I love you.

BRIGID: You know whether you love me or not.

SPADE: Maybe I do. 
He looks hungrily from her hair to her feet and up to her eyes again.

SPADE: I'll have some rotten nights after I've sent you over, but that'll pass. 

(He takes her by the shoulders, bends her back leaning over her)

SPADE: If all I've said doesn't mean anything to you then forget it and we'll make it just this: I won't, because all of me wants to regardless of consequences...and because you've counted on that with me the same as you counted on it with all the others. (He takes his hands from her shoulders, lets them fall to his side)
She puts her hands up to his cheeks, draws his face down towards her again. 

BRIGID: Would you have done this to me if the falcon were real and you got your money? 

SPADE: Don't be too sure I'm as crooked as I'm supposed to be. That sort of reputation might be good business...bringing high-priced jobs and making it easier to deal with the enemy... 

She looks at him, says nothing. Spade moves his shoulders a little.

SPADE:...but a lot more money would have been one more item on your side of the scales. 

BRIGID: If you'd loved me, you wouldn't have needed any more on that side.

She puts her mouth to his slowly and is in his arms when the doorbell RINGS. Before he releases her he calls: 

SPADE: Come in.

123. MED. SHOT - ROOM - ANGLE ON DOOR

Lt. Dundy, Tom Polhaus and two other detectives enter. They look back and forth from Spade to the girl. 

SPADE: Hello, Tom. Got 'em? 

POLHAUS: Got 'em. 

SPADE: Swell! 

SPADE: Here's another one for you.(he pushes Brigid forward) She killed Miles. 

SPADE: Oh, and I've got some exhibits: the boy's guns, one of Cairo's...

SPADE: and a thousand dollar bill I was supposed to be bribed with...and this black statuette here that all the fuss was about.

He turns to Dundy, draws his brows together, leans forward to peer into the lieutenant's face, starts to laugh. 

SPADE: What's the matter with your playmate? 

SPADE: He looks brokenhearted. 

SPADE: I bet when he heard Gutman's story, he thought he had me. 

POLHAUS: Cut it out, Sam. (he looks uneasily at his superior) 
(Spade picks up his hat, puts it on)

SPADE: Well...

SPADE: ...shall we be getting down to the Hall?

Polhaus nods. 

He picks up the falcon. 

POLHAUS: It's heavy. What is it?

Spade takes the falcon back.

SPADE: The stuff that dreams are made of.

POLHAUS: Huh?

The Maltese Falcon

Words by John Huston (and Dashiell Hammett)

Pictures by Arthur Edeson and John Huston

The Maltese Falcon is available on DVD and Blu-Ray on Warner Home Video.

* Bogart's last line, based on a line of Prospero's in Shakespeare's "The Tempest" did not come from Dashiell Hammett's novel nor from John Huston's screenplay. It was suggested to Huston by none other than Humphrey Bogart, according to film noir aficionado Eddie Muller.