​Ferguson Looks at a Movie Icon

By Greg Carlson

gregcarlson1@gmail.com

In a little more than a quarter of the 20th century spanning the 1930s, 1940s and part of the 1950s, Humphrey Bogart built one of the quintessential American filmographies. Stubborn, tenacious, and devoted to his craft, the actor played plenty of thugs and toughs before the eventual turn that would establish leading man bona fides and open the door to a more satisfying range of roles. Belfast-born filmmaker Kathryn Ferguson, whose excellent “Nothing Compares” brought all the necessary fire and fury to the life of Sinead O’Connor, compiles a handsome and worthwhile overview of Bogie in “Bogart: Life Comes in Flashes.” The new feature may not unfold with the same degree of urgency as Ferguson’s look at the Irish pop music star (like Bogart, an iconoclast and legend in her own right), but it is still a terrific overview of one of the great Hollywood icons.

Ferguson bookends the movie at All Saints Episcopal Church in Beverly Hills with footage of Bogart’s memorial service in 1957, a spectacle of mourning attended by a constellation of friends including David Niven, Danny Kaye, Marlene Dietrich, Gregory Peck, Joan Bennett, Spencer Tracy, Gary Cooper, Errol Flynn and many others. In a fashion not unlike the recent Mark Cousins doc “My Name Is Alfred Hitchcock,” Ferguson aims to present as much information as possible in the words of her subject. As performed by Kerry Shale, whose approximation of Bogie is passable, the direct quotations allow the filmmaker to craft enough first-person point-of-view to keep viewers and fans — both casual and devoted — intrigued.

In addition to the voiceover by Shale, Ferguson also draws from the comments of a number of Bogart’s close associates and collaborators to fill in details about the man’s personality, politics and proclivities. The latter of those three categories certainly involved the consumption of a large quantity of alcohol. Ferguson connects many thematic dots by considering each of Bogart’s four marriages and how that particular quartet of women — Helen Menken, Mary Philips, Mayo Methot, and Lauren Bacall — influenced and shaped the actor’s world in public and in private. All four of Bogart’s wives were professional actors and Ferguson fully probes the dynamics of those partnerships.

Ferguson does not neglect the fifth important woman in Bogart’s life: his mother Maud Humphrey, the talented and well-compensated professional illustrator and suffragette whose lack of physical affection left her son with lasting resentment as much as it shaped his often unsentimental outlook. Perhaps enough time has passed (Bogart was born on Christmas Day of 1899) that Bogart and Bacall’s son Stephen, who supported and contributed to the project in collaboration with Humphrey Bogart Estate CEO Robbert de Klerk, felt comfortable cracking the door open a bit more than the typical “authorized” feature.

“Flashes” is not designed or deployed as an in-depth critical biography. Only the career highlights and touchstone movies are addressed; given Bogart’s prolific output, it would be marvelous to see a multipart series covering those big titles as well as the less-discussed but utterly fascinating appearances in the performer’s go-to genres (including film noir/detective fiction, war/combat, melodrama, romance, etc.) as well as his rarer films. Until that unlikely dream takes shape, “Bogart: Life Comes in Flashes” might just generate enough interest to turn casual viewers into more discerning fans. Of course, once a person has seen him at work, Bogart doesn’t really need any help convincing movie lovers to spend quality time with him.