Marketic It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

Acensbart Excellent but underrated film

Stevecorp Don't listen to the negative reviews

Francene Odetta It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

MisterWhiplash The issue with this second adaptation of The Maltese Falcon is that Warner brothers wanted to not really adapt the book; they had adapted it years before, but that was in a pre-code, early-sound era studio that was trying things out. In 1934 Hammett's The Thin Man became a big hit and clearly they saw the author name and thought they could lock in to another winning turn by, in so many words, thin-manning the Maltese Falcon.But these are two very different modes of the author - the Thin Man is a light comedy that has some serious undertones and is commanded by Powell and Loy, and the Maltese Falcon was a hard-boiled detective story where Sam Spade has to avenge his partners murder and becomes embroiled with a host of characters - and director William Dieterle thought he could have it both ways. Certainly Warren William tried to channel Powell a lot here, and he might be good in other movies (I don't recognize him), but he's really a discount William Powell, a guy trying really hard to have that charming, sarcastic patter with everyone. The script doesn't really give the audience a break from his attitude so that when he has to play serious it doesn't stick so much.It may be unfair at first thought to try to compare this to the Huston film since, if for no other reason, this was a world that didn't exist. The one thing that this film can possibly compare favorably is Bette Davis. It's an understatement to say she stole the show; she is having so much fun in this part and at the same time doing her darndest to uplift everyone around her. She is beaming and on fire and alive in every moment on screen and there are a few seconds where it seems like she might, might, get a spark of a connection with William. And she's in about 20 minutes of the 74 minute run time.I think this can be judged on its own terms, and on its own it just compelling past being a typical B movie comedy-cum-thriller. All of the supporting players are trying. Sort of. But a couple of actors, like Marie Wilson as (not) Spade's secretary, are given one character trait and it is grating. The tone is all just off and it is trying to be too light when it needs some darkness or at least some commitment to the dramatics of the story. I will give one little extra point to the end of the film and again how Davis is giving an A+ barn burning performance in the middle of a C-grade production.

MikeMagi Gotta' hand it to Warner Bros, they kept adapting Dasheill Hammett's twisted tale til they got it right. This version, shot some six years earlier than "The Maltese Falcon" can't decide whether it's a comedy or a mystery...and isn't very good as either. As detective Ted Shane, Warren William is so ludicrously blithe that his performance comes off as burlesque. I've been shot at. Ha ha. My, that was close. Isn't detecting fun? Bette Davis does somewhat better as the mystery woman who hires him to find a Saracen horn full of jewels, alternately vamping and double-crossing the private eye. Add Allison Skipworth and Arthur Treacher (yeah, the fish-and-chips guy) in roles that would eventually be better played by Sidney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre and you have a movie that pleads to be re-made. Which fortunately it was.

Robert J. Maxwell True, it's based on Dashiel Hammet's "The Maltese Falcon," just like the Bogart movie a few years later, but the basics of the plot are about all they have in common. "Satan Met A Lady" is breezy and whimsical. As "Ted Shane," the private eye, Warren William is always chuckling and laughing. He finds humor in every situation and his dialog consists of wisecracks and flirtatious double entendres. He strides around, grinning in his long overcoat and wide-brimmed fedora. Brings to mind an opening line of an old novel: "He was born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad." Bette Davis as the character who would later become Brigid O'Shaugnessy, has little to do except respond in a pop-eyed fashion to William's antics. Joel Cairo is gone, replaced by Arthur Treacher as a ten-foot tall Englishman. The most interesting figure, so to speak, is the sexy blond, Marie Wilson, who has taken the part of Effie, Sam Spade's secretary. Wilson is dutiful but dumb. When William asks how she spells her last name, Murgatroyd, she has to stumble through it, letter by letter, and then jumps for joy when she gets it right.It's not a BAD movie. It's just very different from the John Huston version. "Satan Met A Lady" fits better into the genre of fast B-level detective stories that were so common in the 30s, often as second features. God knows the plot of the novel is confusing enough, but when the characters themselves don't really care much about it, the viewer is left deserted, marooned.I'll give one example of the difference in tone and then quit. In Huston's "The Maltese Falcon" (as in the novel), Miles Archer is lured into an alley and shot dead. Spade shows up, looks down at the body of his partner from a distance, then shrugs and moves away with no comment of importance and no display of emotion. Today, the city of San Francisco has a small brass plaque on the corner of a building that fronted the alley, memorializing the event. Bogart's behavior is entirely serious during the scene, and it adds another layer of mystery. The murdered body of his partner is lying at the foot of a hill but Bogart reveals nothing of his feelings. What's going on? In "Satan Met A Lady," William gets a phone call and shows up at the crime scene -- a cemetery this time, with his partner's legs sprawled awkwardly across a tomb stone. William shakes his head a bit, as if having discovered a hangnail, and the situation provides material for a joke: Well, at least if he's going to die, he found the most suitable place for it. The impression is not one of mystery, of feelings or thoughts withheld, but one of shallowness. William seems genuinely not to care.At any rate, if you're looking for a filmed version of the novel, you won't find it here. If you're looking for something that won't challenge you a great deal -- as long as you don't try following the anfractuous plot -- this may be your kind of movie.

zetes The second version of Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon came in the wake of the big success of a cinematic adaptation of another of the author's novels, The Thin Man. So here we get a comic version starring a wise-cracking gentleman, Warren William (who had played Julius Caesar in DeMille's Cleopatra). The comedy is sometimes desperate. It's played WAY over the top. If they had toned in down a tad, and maybe got William Powell instead of Warren William, it would have been a great film. Which would have been terrible because then, if it had been a success, Warner Brothers wouldn't have deigned to remake it five years later. We wouldn't have the 1941 masterpiece, John Huston's career might have went an entirely different way, and film noir wouldn't have developed as we know it. Film history might look damn different just because of this goofy little adaptation! It's generally considered the worst of the three adaptations, but I really liked it. It's a heck of a lot better than the stale '31 version, and it stands as a nice little companion piece to the '41 version. A couple of the actors I really liked, notably Alison Skipworth in the Gutman role (all character names have been changed, by the way, but I'll keep to the originals), Arthur Treacher as Cairo, and Maynard Holmes as Wilmer (shockingly uncredited where several less important characters were!). The best of the best, though: Marie Wilson in the Effie role. Oh. You thought I was going to say Bette Davis. Nah. She's probably the least of the three Brigids. The secretary role is expanded a bit, and she's almost made Spade's love interest. Wilson gives a very cute comic performance. Well worth checking out.