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THE MALTESE FALCON (John Huston)
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John Huston’s adaptation remains one of the most faithful book-to-film translations ever, including a rather startling sexual frankness for the era. (Check the dialogue between Mary Astor’s duplicitous Brigid O’Shaughnessy and Peter Lorre’s Joel Cairo.) It was also an instance where the success of one actor, Humphrey Bogart, depended on another’s idiocy: George Raft didn’t like first-time directors or remakes (Falcon was both), so he turned it down. Huston also grabbed a 60ish stage actor named Sydney Greenstreet for his first film role as a man who’s spent his life pursuing the black statuette of a falcon. Classic in every sense of the word. (Music Hall, June 9-10)