Republished from the show notes of my other site, Fuds on Film.
A film that’s commonly held up as strong contender for John Huston’s best film. This adaptation of the Fallout: New Vegas DLC Dead Money sees Huston’s frequent co-conspirator Humphrey Bogart as Fred C. Dobbs and Tim Holt as Bob Curtin down on their luck in mid 20’s Tampico, after being scammed out of their pay on an oil rig construction project by an unscrupulous boss. Imagine that. In a grimy hostel, they meet an ol’ timer, Walter Huston’s Howard, a gold prospector who claims to have found fortunes and lost them, but feels there’s one last find waiting for him in the Madres.
The three team up and raise the stake money for the initial investment in gear for an expedition to the mountains, and true to his work Howard finds a spot that’s rich for the taking, even if that taking is long, laborious, difficult work. Howard also warns that gold has an effect on man’s mind, certainly when combined with the isolation of working in such isolated conditions. While Dobbs and Curtin dismiss this, sure that their partnership will remain strong, it’s not long before Howards proven right about this too.
It’s not just simple greed that starts gnawing at them, Dobbs in particular, but some interlopers into the situation, such as Bruce Bennett’s James Cody who tracks Curtin back from a resupply trip, unconvinced by the tale of them being game hunters. He wants in on the action, but before the trio can get round to declining this invitation with a terminal refusal, a group of bandits appear. In the gunfight that follows, before they are seen off by the Federales, Cody cops a fatal case of lead poisoning.
Reasoning that the situation is getting too hot, Dobbs, Curtin and Howard resolve to divide up the spoils of the mine and head back to civilisation, but Howard is called away by local villagers to provide medical aid to a sick child. Without a mediating presence, Dobbs and Curtin have increasingly heated arguments, up to the point where a crazed Dobbs shoots Curtin, resolving to make off with all of the gold. However, the bandits may have other plans, while Curtin isn’t quite as dead as Dobbs thinks he is, having managed to crawl away, saved by the local villagers and Howard’s ministrations. Somewhat recovered, they go after Dobbs, and then the bandits, where they can reclaim their mules, but not the gold, now scattered to the four winds.
While there’s a lot of things happening in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre to fulfil its’ billing as an adventure flick, the most interesting things by far isn’t any of the shootouts or mine cave-ins, fine as they are, it’s Humphrey Bogart muttering to himself as he falls deeper into a grip of paranoia, suspicion and assorted ill-intents, which is a joy to watch and if anything, the film could do with more of it. Tim Holt’s Curtin is a reasonable blank slate for Bogart to bounce off off, although I don’t think he’s able to play at the same level as Bogart or, John Huston’s dad, which is perhaps less a criticism of Curtin and a reflection of the talents of Bogie and Huston Snr.
So, a good adventure film with great performances and a solid underpinning exploring how greed can destroy your character, set in the beautiful, rugged Mexican mountainside. What’s not to love? Not a lot. It’s not exactly breaking with film critic dogma to say that The Treasure of the Sierra Madre is, y’know, good, but it is what it is. I would say that this is a film you must watch before you die, but only because watching it after you are dead is going to be tricky.