Game #10: The Maltese Falcon

"The Stuff that Dreams are Made of..."

Fun fact: When you google image search "Maltese Falcon", the first thing that comes up is a dozen or so pictures of this yacht. 

Because of course that's what I was looking for. That yacht is WAY more influential than the 1941 film starring Humphrey Bogart. Why would I be interested in some stupid black-and-white movie that delves into the nature of human greed? Why would I want to see one of THE movies that defined Noir as a genre? 

YACHTS. That's what I'm about.

It's tough to say what would make you sicker, though: Sailing, or this drinking game.

"The Malt Liquor Falcon": The Rules

We used scotch for this game. Not good scotch mind you, we're not nearly rich or foolish enough for that. You can drink it straight, on the rocks, or with ginger ale. 

Those of us who drank scotch neat actually got less drunk than those who played with mixers, because they had to take smaller sips. So keep that in mind.

So it's not 300 years old. It's fine for our purposes.

Easy Mode

1. Drink for Title drops. For easy mode, that's "The Maltese Falcon"
   
   
2. Drink when they drink.
   
   
3. Drink for Daddy Issues. Nowhere to be found. But you won't need that rule.
   
   
4. Drink when someone lights a cigarette (twice for a cigar).
   
   
5. Drink when someone accuses another of being a liar. They should use the word "liar" or "lying".
   

Medium Mode
All the above rules apply. Also...

1. Drink for Title Drops. For Medium Mode, that's "Falcon".
   
   
2. Drink whenever you see a man not wearing a hat. 
   
   
3. Drink whenever Spade takes something from somebody's pockets. He's just doing a thorough investigation.
   

Hard Mode
All the above rules apply. Also...

1. Drink whenever someone makes or receives a phone call. Half the exposition gets delivered this way.
   
   
2. Drink for title drops. For Hard Mode, that's whenever they say "bird". They're not always talking about the falcon. 
   

The Players

Our on screen players are Krissy (me), Sandy B'Drinkin and The Bishop. We discussed our favorite noir tropes.

Our off screen players are...
Williams: The police officer (Easy)
ChampJagne AustGin: The leading lady (Medium)
Seb: The double-agent (Medium)
Paul [Big Moose]: The informant (Medium)

This game is good, it's very good. Just how good? Let's find out!

Putting the "Hump" in "Humphrey"

If you've been reading this blog for a while, you know that the majority of us playing these games are female. The vast majority of us are interested in men. And if there's a thing 40's movies did better than today's films, it's men.

Brooding, dangerous, surly men.

We COULD NOT shut up whenever Humphrey Bogart was on screen. Everything he does, he does with intention. Taking off his coat, lighting a cigarette (drink!), even just the simple act of listening to a client all sent us into swooning. The amount of catcalling that went on during this game must have broken some record. 

But about fifteen minutes in, we started to analyze our reactions, because most of us think too much. What makes Bogie so attractive? It's not like he's particularly handsome. He's got kind of a weird face. And by all accounts he's remembered as being kind of a tool to other people. So what gives?

"I think it's his huge eyes," put in Seb. "I think that's what makes him handsome."

Of course, big eyes aren't everything.

"This wouldn't work if he weren't billed as the main character who we're supposed to sympathize with," said Paul after Humphrey extorted $500 from Mary Astor. "We excuse his doucheness."

Later he turned to me and said, "You know he does cowboy movies too, right?"

Um.

"I feel like this movie will be playing at all of our bachelorette parties". -Champjagne Austgin

With that bit of information, all logical analysis flew out the window. Let's just take if for granted that Sam Spade is the sexiest private eye in all of San Francisco.

Speaking of San Francisco...

This is something you might not notice upon first viewing, or at all unless you're looking for it, but there are actually a decent amount of homosexual characters in this movie. Now that I've got your attention, can you guess who they are?

No, no...try again...

You see, dear readers, The Maltese Falcon was released to the public while a set of censorship standards called "The Hays Code" was in place. The Hays Code is the reason you don't see a married couple sleeping in the same bed on old television shows, or hear even the most unsavoriest of types use swear words. It was a set of "moral guidelines" for television and movies, to make sure the general public's sensibilities weren't somehow damaged by anything they might seen told in a story. Despite trouble upholding the code, the rules stated therein still had a huge effect on how movies and television were produced, and on what content could be allowed to slip through public inspection.

Among other things, homosexuality (still widely considered a sexual perversion at the time) was a verboten topic for any film. But the book The Maltese Falcon was based on contains numerous gay men as characters! Not just background goons either, major players like Joel Cairo, or Spade's police officer foils, Polehaus and Dundy. If he wants to stay true to the source material, what's a director to do?

The answer: be subtle.

Subtle like a fox.

A great way to make clear to an audience that a character is gay without making it his only trait, or without drawing too much attention to his/her sexuality, is to go through a "coding" process, littering the film with symbols, mannerisms and references that do the talking for them. From the moment Cairo enters the film, he comes across as somewhat removed from Bogie's hard-edged world. He speaks softly, fusses over his clothes...and when Bogie rummages through his coat after knocking him out (drink!), he comes across some rather incriminating evidence.

"Looks like this guy takes in a lot of theatre, if you know what I mean."

All of these little touches are incredibly effective at conveying character. Instead of falling back on stereotype, or outright discussing a character's orientation, the director threads it seamlessly into the narrative, letting the audience fill in the blanks while focusing on what actually matters: the story. So these restrictions, while questionable, actually helped contribute to the quality of the film. Nothing's better for a piece of art than setting parameters for the artist.

The Hays Code was taken seriously by a lot of people for about two decades. See if you can find other ways filmmakers tried to subvert censorship!

"Sgt Polehaus, huh? He can house my pole any day". -Big Moose

A Detective's Duty

This movie's about the lengths people are willing to go through for an imaginary ideal. The Maltese Falcon is one of the most prolific McGuffins; it's only valuable because people think it's worth something. It doesn't actually do anything except be worth a lot of money. Yet the characters in the movie devote their lives to owning it, throwing in the amount of energy a normal person would give to a great love or their careers. Because once they have the falcon, their lives will be perfect.

Eh. I've seen prettier.

But this mode of thought doesn't only apply to the bird. It extends itself into Spade's very motivation; he acts as he does because he believes it's how a detective should act. Within the first fifteen minutes of the movie, Spade's partner Miles Archer is killed by Floyd Thursby, who was also after the falcon. Everyone takes this kind of hard, even though nobody really liked Miles. As evidenced by his first interaction with Mary Astor's character, he's kind of a sleezebag.

"Miles, you are married as balls." -Sandy B'Drinkin.

But Spade spends the rest of the movie trying to track down Miles' killer, eventually determining that Brigid, who he's been having an off-screen love affair with, is responsible for his death. He turns her over to the police, despite her protestations, and defends his actions thusly:

"When a man's partner is killed, he's supposed to do something about it. It doesn't make any difference what you thought of him. He was your partner and you're supposed to do something about it. And it happens we're in the detective business. Well, when one of your organization gets killed, it's-it's bad business to let the killer get away with it, bad all around, bad for every detective everywhere."

This scene is gorgeous. Spade's admitting that he couldn't stand Miles, but for the sake of his professional integrity, he had to tie up all loose ends relating to his murder. For the sake of an ideal, he put a woman he loved in jail for ending the life of a man who meant little to him. It's an intense look at human morality.

Utter Chaos

Of course, I only know about this beautiful ending because I re-watched the movie after the game. By the time we got to this point, most of us were incoherent. A couple of us bravely tried to keep track of the twisting plot, but more often than not our concentration was broken by someone making dick jokes or something.

Even before then, though, we were all pretty raucous. The melodrama was contagious, and we couldn't help gasping or shouting whenever a character did something unexpected. The only difference the scotch made was the loss of our sparkling wits and large vocabularies.

"This is the first time I've seen the entire room collectively lose grammar," Seb remarked.

Woke up without a hangover, though. So that's something.

The Result

After the movie, we talked about our least favorite noir tropes. "Women wearing furs" was not one of them.

This game is beautiful. It may be my favorite so far. Don't play medium or up if you've never seen the movie, though, or you won't get much out of it. 

The other problem is that Easy Mode is WAY too easy. Williams drank beer instead of scotch and didn't even make it through her second can, so she was none too tipsy. Here are some extra rules to tack onto Easy Mode.

Drink whenever Humphrey Bogart touches his face.
I have no idea if it's a character choice or a mannerism of his, but there are several instances in this movie of Bogie playing with his lips or something. It's still compelling, but it strikes you as odd.

Drink whenever a woman shows weak or defensive behavior.
Despite moments of badassery, the women in this film are all kind of wet blankets. If they scheme, they scheme from the background while the men do the heavy lifting, and they cry and/or faint frequently. Drink for the fairer sex!

"I love how 'shall I carry you' is an option." -The Bishop

Drink whenever somebody gets punched or kicked.
This movie features several exchanged blows, including a punch to the throat! Yay, violence!

Thanks for reading! Next week we're taking a look at a modern classic, as recommended by a fan in the comments section.

Uh...that is...I don't...hoo, boy...

Follow us on Twitter @Krissy Pappau for drunk talk and other chatter