Very good, solid 'noir' and thanks to the writing of David Goodis, just that little bit different. Point of view camera devise during first half is not simply a gimmick but necessary if Bogart was to play throughout the film and considering how haggard looking he appears at times, probably not a bad idea. he performs well though and especially with Lauren Bacall, looking her loveliest and performing as strongly as she ever did. Lots of surprises, much antagonism shown against the police by all concerned and some wonderful location shooting in San Francisco, looking all the better in Blu-ray. The direction is assured and very good performances are got from everyone helping this unusual film along very nicely. Tension, humour and romance with a good dollop of cynicism.

One of the worst noir movies I've ever seen. Annoying beginning SPOILER where you can't see Bogie's face for what seems like hours. Stupid plot, stupid plot developments, stupid stupid stupid. The only saving grace was Bacall in her prime, and Agnes Moorehead as vamp!. Don't waste your time.

A star vehicle for Bogart and Bacall, the third among their total four collaborations, DARK PASSAGE is produced in the apex of film-noir fad, Bogart plays Vincent Parry, a convict who has been accused of murdering his wife, is bent on finding the real killer after stowing away on a supply truck out of San Quentin prison in the opening scenes. A conspicuous gambit is from the word go, directer Delmer Daves has been obstinately taking a first-person perspective of the narrative, accompanied by Bogart's voice-over narrating his inner thoughts, but never puts Vincent's visage in front of the camera, not until well over an hour into the movie, would we see Bogart's weather-beaten face for the first time, simply because, before that point, Vincent doesn't have a face like Bogart's! It is a novel move to tap into the facing-changing gimmick, although the film ineptly takes oceanic artistic license to justify/simplify the whole enterprise, from the Good Samaritan cabbie ( D'Andrea), surely is a chatty loner, who implausibly proposes the idea to Vincent after recognizing him, a wife-murder on the lam, not even for a monetary gain, to a shaggy-dog looking doctor (Stevenson)'s seemingly dubious business, until the pitch-perfect debut of a brand new face without any traceable marks left (an in-joke is to make Vincent look older than his real age, at the expense of Bogart's senescent bearing and his May-December marriage with Bacall), it might be able to pull the wool over the eyes of audience at that time, but viewed as this day, unintentionally it looks more like droll derision to the orthopaedic progression than anything scintillating. Flimsy on reasoning and far-fetched in pigeonholing a grand scheme into a meagre group of players (perusing the not-so-long cast list, a film connoisseur could winnow out who would be most adequate to assume the role of final revelation without any trouble), in fact, the film's whodunit convolution undeservedly concedes the spotlight to the mawkish romance between Vincent and Irene Jansen (Bacall), that's the selling point! The latter, a strong-willed rich gal, incorrigibly falls for a presumed wife-murderer, her undoubted certitude of the former's innocence is thinly based on preconceived notion and if taking out of the context of the two stars' personal intimacy, their liaison doesn't make sense in either way, but as usual, the girl's motivation bears the brunt of character underdevelopment, since Bogart's Vincent at least evokes a dew-eyed veneer of passivity in all the pandemonium which can allure those soft-hearted.On the plus side, Ms. Moorehead is fiercely catty and menacing to a fault, Daves makes impressive uses of San Francisco's film-genic topography and its art deco trimmings, together with DP Sidney Hickox's sharply expressive deep-focus shots, on top of a cock and bull escapist tale tempered by a soupçon of schmaltz and a big chunk of wishfulness.

"Dark Passage" is an example of how a gimmick can work wonders.Humphrey Bogart plays an escaped con who was wrongfully accused of murdering his wife -- of course he was wrongfully accused....he's Bogie! To evade the law, he enlists the help of a shady plastic surgeon to give him a new face. While he's waiting for his face to heal, he's nursed by none other than Lauren Bacall, fetching as hell as a do-gooder who wants to help him because her own father was similarly wrongfully accused of a crime. The gimmick is that we don't see Bogie's face for the first half of the movie. Much of the film is shot in first-person perspective except for the occasional establishing shot. Once his face is in bandages, the film switches to a more omniscient perspective, but we still don't get a glimpse of that hang-dog mug until the bandages come off.After Bogie becomes Bogie again, he sets out to solve the mystery of his wife's true murderer, which brings Agnes Moorehead into the picture, absolutely sensational as a shrill harridan with whom Bogie has some history. Moorehead steals the picture simply by being on the screen, a considerable feat given the screen presence of Bogie and the visual sizzle of Bacall.The first half of "Dark Passage" is effectively eerie; the first-person camera work really adds to the atmosphere, and Bogart's bandaged visage lends a creepiness to things. The second half is more conventional in terms of filmmaking, but by then the engaging plot and the presence of Moorehead have successfully filled in for what the film loses in visual interest."Dark Passage" is a real winner.Grade: A