Colibel
Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.
Jenni Devyn
Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.
Armand
it reminds Casablanca and a lot of other films about same theme. it has the virtue to be a kind of crossroad of genres. and , the great thing, it is a film with Humphrey Bogart. the same. nothing new or original or seductive. at the first view. but... . each film with Bogart is a form of revelation about him. because it is really the best American actor but that title has a profound source. not only the art or the dialogs, the script or the gestures but something who becomes magic, a spectacular mixture of force and vulnerability who has as result a hero out of each ordinary definition. a war film and a love film. and, more important, a magnificent actor. that is all. Sirocco is not a surprise. maybe not a delight. but a very useful lesson. and that is a serious great stuff.
soccerman1960
It appears that many (most?) critics and viewers here alike are stuck in a rut of complaint, that this movie reminds them of Casablanca, but then refuses to be Casablanca. I wrestled with tagging this as a spoiler, but I have to say that the following point is essential to my appreciation for the film: Bogart? His character here is not supposed to be confused for Rick Blaine so much as contrasted with him, as well as an earlier Bogart classic role--Harry Morgan of To Have and Have Not. In truth, despite the coincidence of a beautiful and exotic Swedish co-star, (and, yes, Marta Toren is no Ingrid Bergman), "Harry Smith" of Sirocco (not even the character's real name, as we learn as we go along) can't even be so generously described as an "opportunist". Heart of gold? Not even close. Harry is a fully-fallen and corrupt profiteer who makes his living enabling the slaughter and death of soldiers and civilians alike. He abandons his loyal sidekick as easily as he flees his girlfriend. His denouement (this is absolutely a noir) is thus essential to his character, as is his moral redemption within that framework.In the end, Bogart and his character are the MacGuffin, and the real conflict, and the real heart of the story, is within the soul of Lee J. Cobb's character, and his outstanding performance as the French intelligence officer, Colonel Feroud. Feroud allows an underling to be sent to his certain death, and he beats his girlfriend when her torment overwhelms him, but he spends the entire picture fighting to maintain his professionalism and his dignity and his humanity against all odds in a world where all is savage and cruel, and there very well be no "right" at all. That Bogart/Smith awakens at the last, to understand the difference between them, is the light shining on Feroud, not Smith. Watching this film again, and viewing Bogart/Smith's sacrifice in those terms is to see a far more mature and nuanced film than Casablanca and To Have and Have Not were able to be, as "A picture" vehicles required to have noble endings.No, this is no 1940's film of good guy vs bad guy idealism. This is both a 1950's film of burgeoning cold war cynicism, as well as a timeless study of intractable sectarian conflict that is so topical today, where everything in the world is shades of gray, yet the people in it still have to decide what is "moral" among the shrinking number of corrupt choices they have left. Bogart disliked his performance, but I wonder how he would view it now, so many decades later?For me, this one was of the most rewarding films I have watched in a long time, and it has awakened a curiosity for more of Bernhardt's pieces, all of the descriptions of which seem to have this kind of timeless moral ambiguity at their center.Set aside your campy Hollywood ideals, and your search for 2-dimensional good guys with rough exteriors and hearts of gold. This is an adult picture with more to offer than mere cliché.
SipteaHighTea
The film was awful went it came to the fighting between the French and the Syrians. There should have been a lot more gun fire between the French and the insurgents. There should have been a lot more explosions of French artillery shells bombarding the city. They show the city against the background of a early sunrise; however, there was no heavy columns of smoke that resulted from the French artillery shells exploding in the city There was also no sound of French airplanes and having them bomb and machine gun the Syrians' positions.In addition, the way the French troops move around the city was terrible. In a combat situation, troops would have their rifles at port arms so they be ready to bring their weapons to a firing position just in case they get fire upon. They would not be walking around the city with rifles on their shoulders and walking in a parade ground formation.One person stated that the American people during the 1920s never heard of the Syrian revolt. I suspect one reason why the Americans never heard about it that the American press was concentrating on Prohibition, robbers like Pretty Boy Floyd, John Dillinger, organized crime like Al Capone, labor strikes that occurred after World War I, and the communist scare of the 1920s. Even if it was printed in the paper, it was just a sideshow event that never got much notice. I bet that today most Americans still don't know about the revolt in Syria. The only time we paid attention to Syria was during the various Arab-Israeli Wars and Syrian intervention in Lebanon.It was and still easier to concentrate on doing war movies against the Japan and Germany since we won those wars.
danielj_old999
(Marta Toren to Bogie)....what a great line! I'm surprised it hasn't gone down in the lexicon of great movie quips...and it captures perfectly the paradoxical mystery of Bogie's eternal charm, as well as the mystery of how an essentially mediocre film can be redeemed by its own dry, sardonic charm (due largely to help from fine supporting players as much as from Bogie), some great B/W photography, and a persistently downbeat refusal to push any sort of patriotic agenda.(adding greatly to that charm quotient.) The postwar noir influence is in fine fettle here. So Bogie doesn't exactly have a great motivation for his final decision? He just changed his mind, that's all. Take it or leave it. "I've taken long chances before. Okay." What could be better than that? It's the way people act every day. Every good critical eye without a mote in it knows that this film is safely and securely within the universe of the best product Hollywood ever put out, a great, mordant, counterweight universe to the unwatchable sap they themselves were producing right alongside it. "Sirocco" is not even really that minor a star in that universe. Good, good, good.
