No Happy Ending for Bogart

Dix Steele (Humphrey Bogart) and Laurel Gray (Gloria Grahame)
share a touching moment on the beach in "In a Lonely Place."

In a Lonely Place (1950, Columbia)

Starring Humphrey Bogart, Gloria Grahame,

Frank Lovejoy, Carl Benton Reid;

Screenplay by Andrew Solt; Directed by Nicholas Ray

Screen legend Humphrey Bogart gave magnificent performances in a number of iconic films, such as “The Maltese Falcon,” “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre,” “The Big Sleep,” “The African Queen,” and, of course, “Casablanca.” His portrayal of Dixon “Dix” Steele in “In a Lonely Place” deserves to be among them.

An often dark story about a man who pays a terrible price because of his inner demons, “In a Lonely Place” also shines a less-than-flattering light on Hollywood and celebrity in a film powered more by character development than plot.

Dix is an antisocial, down-and-out screenwriter whose violent tendencies are displayed shortly after the credits end when he gets out of his car to fight another motorist. They turned up again a few minutes later when he punches a bar patron. Although he hasn’t had a hit screenplay “since before the war,” Dix bristles when his agent brings him an offer to write a script based on a trashy novel.

That doesn’t stop him from bringing home a hatcheck girl to tell him the plot of the novel so he doesn’t have to read it, however. When she’s found dead the next morning, the police take Dix downtown. Laurel Gray (Gloria Grahame), his neighbor across the courtyard, lifts the suspicion briefly when she tells detectives she saw the hatcheck girl leave Dix’s apartment that night. But despite an attempt by his cop friend Brub (Frank Lovejoy) to take some of the heat off of him, Brub’s captain (Carl Benton Reid) believes Dix is guilty and works hard to get the proof.

In many films, that plot line would be center stage. But here it takes a backseat to the love story that grows between Laurel and Dix. She tempers Dix’s dark side, takes care of him and becomes his muse as he writes a script that towers above its source material. The lovely Laurel inspires him to write this line: “I was born when she kissed me. I died when she left me. I lived a few weeks while she loved me,” which I dare anyone to top.

But pressure from the police investigation begins to ignite his temper and Dix reverts to his old self. Those episodes prompt Laurel to believe that Dix is capable of murder, and she begins to fear that soon she will be a target of his wrath. It all culminates in one of the saddest film endings ever, one that touched me personally because my own demons cost me the love of a good woman as well.

As good as Bogart is, the quality of Grahame’s performance matches his. Known mostly for femme fatale roles in film noir, she is wonderful in the role of the sympathetic Laurel because she also makes the bitter Dix sympathetic. Even though you know their love is doomed, it’s hard not to root for things to work out.

I know I did.