Quartile rating: 7.5/10 · 1 rating
Given a pardon from jail, Roy Earle gets back into the swing of things as he robs a swanky resort.
High Sierra is a transitional noir-crime film elevated enormously by Humphrey Bogart's complex, sympathetic performance as Roy Earle — one of his defining pre-Casablanca roles. The plot is competent but follows a fairly standard heist-gone-wrong structure with a romantic subplot that varies in effectiveness. The cinematography is solid classical Hollywood work but not especially distinguished. The film's novelty lies in its humanizing treatment of the criminal protagonist, giving the genre more psychological depth than was typical, though it doesn't radically reinvent the form. The ending, set on the Sierra Nevada slopes, is genuinely powerful and memorable — a fatalistic, mythic conclusion that elevates the entire picture and cemented the film's legacy.