The Maltese Falcon
At the beginning of the film when Miles is killed, Sam seems super indifferent which immediately made me lean towards disliking him. His partner died and it seemed to make zero difference to him whatsoever.
I thought the scene where Cairo came into Sam's office and held him at gunpoint illustrated an important quality of Sam's character. Sam responds to Cairo's threat by knocking him out cold, searching his belongings, and then he gives the gun back and lets Cairo search the room anyway. His reasoning is that he can't just have people barging in and looking around. Essentially Sam doesn't want anyone to get the best of him, even when he has nothing to lose or hide.
My general impression of Sam was that he seemed to just enjoy having power over people. I got this impression based on how he deals with other people, and his general mannerisms. When he enters a room he moves around the room a lot, and is usually leaning in towards or backing down whoever he is talking to.
A good example of this can be seen in his interactions with the fat dude's gunman. In the scene where the gunman is in the lobby reading a newspaper, Sam walks up to him and blows smoke directly in his face. In another scene, he is being led into the room by the gunman, then he turns around, disarms the guy, and makes him walk first into the room empty handed. This doesn't really serve any purpose other than to make the guy look bad in front of his boss.
In another scene in the hotel room, Sam screams at the fat man, walks out of the room, and is grinning. In/after every interaction, Sam is grinning. He seems to be either screwing with everyone he interacts with or he thinks that he's always right and thus doesn't take others very seriously (or maybe some combination of the two).
A lot of the mystery comes from the characters' reluctance to put even a single card on the table. A lot of the interactions involve one character withholding information (the girl constantly telling Sam that he has to trust her, even when she just admitted to lying earlier), or refusing to give information unless they will receive information from the other person. The lack of knowledge about any of the characters makes it difficult to discern who you are supposed to trust. Even Sam, the main character does not seem particularly trustworthy given the way that he treats everyone else.
Given the fact that Sam seems to enjoy being in control while also making others look bad, the ending isn't surprising in that he sells everyone out, even the girl, but the interesting part to me was when he said something about when your partner dies you do something about it. This statement completely disagreed with my initial thought that Sam didn't care that his partner died. I still don't believe that he particularly liked Miles, but he cared enough to get justice for him.
Also as a side note, what was the acting in the last scene in Sam's home? The gunman has tears streaming down his face over seemingly nothing, and Cairo screams and cries like an infant girl when they discover the falcon is a fake. I had a hard time taking that scene even remotely seriously.
I thought the scene where Cairo came into Sam's office and held him at gunpoint illustrated an important quality of Sam's character. Sam responds to Cairo's threat by knocking him out cold, searching his belongings, and then he gives the gun back and lets Cairo search the room anyway. His reasoning is that he can't just have people barging in and looking around. Essentially Sam doesn't want anyone to get the best of him, even when he has nothing to lose or hide.
My general impression of Sam was that he seemed to just enjoy having power over people. I got this impression based on how he deals with other people, and his general mannerisms. When he enters a room he moves around the room a lot, and is usually leaning in towards or backing down whoever he is talking to.
A good example of this can be seen in his interactions with the fat dude's gunman. In the scene where the gunman is in the lobby reading a newspaper, Sam walks up to him and blows smoke directly in his face. In another scene, he is being led into the room by the gunman, then he turns around, disarms the guy, and makes him walk first into the room empty handed. This doesn't really serve any purpose other than to make the guy look bad in front of his boss.
In another scene in the hotel room, Sam screams at the fat man, walks out of the room, and is grinning. In/after every interaction, Sam is grinning. He seems to be either screwing with everyone he interacts with or he thinks that he's always right and thus doesn't take others very seriously (or maybe some combination of the two).
A lot of the mystery comes from the characters' reluctance to put even a single card on the table. A lot of the interactions involve one character withholding information (the girl constantly telling Sam that he has to trust her, even when she just admitted to lying earlier), or refusing to give information unless they will receive information from the other person. The lack of knowledge about any of the characters makes it difficult to discern who you are supposed to trust. Even Sam, the main character does not seem particularly trustworthy given the way that he treats everyone else.
Given the fact that Sam seems to enjoy being in control while also making others look bad, the ending isn't surprising in that he sells everyone out, even the girl, but the interesting part to me was when he said something about when your partner dies you do something about it. This statement completely disagreed with my initial thought that Sam didn't care that his partner died. I still don't believe that he particularly liked Miles, but he cared enough to get justice for him.
Also as a side note, what was the acting in the last scene in Sam's home? The gunman has tears streaming down his face over seemingly nothing, and Cairo screams and cries like an infant girl when they discover the falcon is a fake. I had a hard time taking that scene even remotely seriously.
I definitely agree with your comments on lying and deception during the film. It seems to be a constant theme, where everybody is lying to each others faces so they can individually profit. At the end of the day, they are all looking out for themselves including Sam. One could interpret this film to be a commentary on self interest and what extents people will go to in order to profit.
ReplyDelete