Pretty Good

Highly Overrated But Still Good

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Producer: Walter Wanger. Copyright 8 August 1938 by Walter Wanger Productions, Inc. Released through United Artists. New York opening at the Radio City Music Hall: 14 July 1938 (ran three weeks). U.S. release: 5 August 1938. Australian release: October-December 1938. 10 reels. 96 minutes.SYNOPSIS: A leading French criminal, Pepe le Moko, is holed up in the Casbah, a slum section of Algiers where the police are unable to lay hands on him. A shrewd native police inspector forges a plan to force Pepe to venture into the streets.NOTES: Charles Boyer was nominated for The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' Annual award for Best Actor, losing to Spencer Tracy in Boys Town. The picture also received nominations for Supporting Actor, Gene Lockhart (losing to Walter Brennan in Kentucky); Cinematographer, James Wong Howe; and Art Director, Alexander Toluboff. Only Toluboff was nominated, not his associate, Wade Rubottom, nor even Jacques Krauss whose designs Toluboff and Rubottom scrupulously followed. An outstanding success at box-offices worldwide, the film made an international star of Hedy Lamarr, here making her first English-language film. Hedy was borrowed from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer at the insistence of Charles Boyer (who himself was forever identified with his role in this picture). Although Algiers did not make Frank S. Nugent's "Ten Best Films of 1938" for The New York Times, the movie does figure prominently in his supplementary list.COMMENT: Virtually a 90% shot-for-shot remake of the Duvivier "Pepe le Moko", even down to the casting of the support players and their costumes. True, Boyer does create an individual portrait, much softer and more romantic than Jean Gabin's. He is helped by changes in the script which make Le Moko far less vicious and by a slightly different ending which preserves his romantic image. Otherwise, this is simply Pepe le Moko re-visited, with slight changes of emphasis and camera angles here and there, some for the better, some neutral, but fortunately none for the worse. Fortunately, the acting is easier to compare. Leonid Kinsky (of all people) comes over with particular effectiveness in this version and-thanks to some clever bits of business of his own invention-easily outshines an extremely skillful Marcel Dalio. All the other players, however, including Miss Gurie and Miss Lamarr, are either equaled or outclassed by their French equivalents. Gene Lockhart's portrayal is scrupulously modeled on Charpin's even down to his facial expressions, while Joseph Calleia gamely attempts to imitate Lucas Gridoux right down to the way he twirls his swagger stick. Nonetheless, if you're imitating someone or something that's really first class, you can't do much better than that!

Algiers (1938) was directed by John Cromwell. It stars Charles Boyer as Pepe le Moko, a famed Parisian jewel thief, who now lives in the Casbah with his gang. He's safe in the native quarter, because it's full of alleys and passageways, and the population admires and protects him.Pepe has a lover, Ines, played by the lovely Sigrid Gurie. A police inspector, Slimane, considers Pepe his friend. However, as he tells Pepe, he'll arrest him some day.The situation is stable until a beautiful young French woman named Gaby, played by Hedy Lamarr, enters the Casbah and Pepe's life. Gaby is a kept woman, and is soon to be a rich man's trophy wife. She is beautiful as only Lamarr could be beautiful.We know Pepe will fall in love with her, and we know he will leave Ines for Gaby, but we don't know what will happen after that. (Well, we sort of know, but we're not supposed to know.)Boyer and Lamarr are ideal for their parts. However, I was equally impressed by Joseph Calleia as Slimane. He is a man who lives in both worlds--the Casbah and the police headquarters. He fits in in both worlds, but he's not fully trusted in either one.In the 21st Century, this movie is definitely dated. For example, it was completed at a time when the fact that one of the gangsters beats his wife is taken as a matter of course. (Some things have improved in the last 75 years.)However, as melodrama, Algiers is definitely a success. Boyer and Lamarr have the right chemistry, and the plot, if predictable, will still hold your attention.We saw the movie on DVD, where it worked very well. If you can't find it in a revival theater, see it on the small screen. You'll enjoy the film and you'll be glad you watched it.P.S. Boyer never says, "Come with me to the Casbah." In fact, Pepe is tired of the Casbah, and would rather be in Paris. Still, the quotation has a life of its own, and gives us a sense of how popular the film must have been in its day.

Walter Wanger released this classic drama in 1938 as a remake of a play earlier made into a film. Is the Casbah a geographic location you can find on a map, an uncontrollable twist of fate often used in other pieces of fiction or a state of mind you create from your own failings? The film brilliantly portrays this dilemma through superlative performances by Hedy Lamarr, Sigrid Gurie and Charles Boyer leading a first class Hollywood cast who keep you fascinated every moment. The plot sketch is one told before and told again about a retired jewel thief, convinced he has found a safe haven to live out his golden years, understands, only down the road, his own physical needs, some brilliant detective work and some enemies he has made along the way conspire against it. The negatives are low budget sets and lighting. Balancing it are ever fascinating plot twists, memorable dialogue and the lures of Hedy Lamarr's apparent first film contracted in the US and the first look for Americans at the native quarter of Algiers in Algeria. Once Boyer and Lamarr knock it out of the park in the bracelet dialogue scene, the film is in high gear keeping you fascinated every moment and even overwhelmed at the denouement.

Algiers is not a classic, it is a perversion of the wonderful original Pepe le Moko, directed by Duvivier and starring a much more attractive and charming Pepe, Jean Gabin. If you want to fully experience the Casbah and the characters in Algiers, I recommend you don't even watch this movie and see Pepe le Moko instead, for it is much more elaborate, more beautifully filmed, the lines are not clichéd and the characters adhere much more to reality. Furthermore, the ending is so dramatic and key to Pepe's character that you'll find the Algiers version intolerable. Although Algiers does an almost excellent job mimicking each scene, the acting falls short as does the credibility of the characters. Plus, the wardrobe is truly breath-taking in all scenes, particularly Pepe's in the last scene and Gaby's (at all times) but also when she's on the boat. Frankly, Algiers is cheap as far as imitations go.