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Sunday, September 2, Golden Auditorium (Little Hall), 8:30pm
Bring Paper and Pencil

The Maltese Falcon (1941)

* Academy Award Nomination

100 minutes. The mysterious Miss Wonderly hires Spade and Archer to shadow a man named Thursby, and Archer is killed while doing so. An hour later Thursby is killed. Spade confronts Wonderly, who confesses her real name is Brigid O’Shaughnessy, and claims that the people who killed Thursby are after her as well. Spade (who is, himself, under suspicion for both the murders and is trying to avoid Archer’s widow, Iva, with whom he’s had an affair) is attracted to O’Shaughnessy and decides to help her. This leads him to the strange trio of the foppish Joel Cairo, Kasper “Fat Man” Gutman, and the inept Wilmer Cook. All are on the trail of the Maltese Falcon, a gold and jewel encrusted figurine which has been coated with black enamel... How many will die before they find the stuff that dreams are made of?

Adapted from Silver & Ward, eds. (1992) Film Noir: An Encyclopedic Reference to the American Style, 3rd Ed. Woodstock, New York: The Overlook Press.

See the IMDb Maltese Falcon page
for full cast and production details,
goofs, quotes, and more.

Some Discussion Questions:

1. In what ways, and to what extent, does this film fit into the stylistic category of film noir? Consider:
   • plot,
   • characters (not only their types, but also their emotions, motivations, and interrelations),
   • visual elements (use of light and shadow, camera placement and movement, shot composition, framing, use of deep focus...), and
   • sound
   Also consider how the various elements listed work systematically to reinforce each other and convey a mood and a meaning in a sequence or in the film as a whole.

2. Compare the three female characters (Effie, Brigid, Iva) and the way they are constructed in the film. Which woman is strongest? Why? Pay particular attention to their relations to Spade.

3. What kind of man is Spade? What are his motivations early in the film, do they remain constant? Pay close attention to his explanation(s) for his final act—does it ring true, and what does it reveal about him? To what degree does he fulfill one of the two main character motifs (as discussed by Silver) of alienation and obsession? Does his character develop or change at all by the end of the movie? More simply, is he better or worse off, than before first laying eyes on Brigid?

4. Is there an overall moral structure to this film, and if so, how is it displayed and fulfilled (or undermined)?

5. What is the Maltese Falcon? What is the narrative function of the way in which the quest for it is resolved (or left unresolved)?

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