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“Beat the Devil went straight from box office flop to cult classic and has been called the first camp movie… The movie has above all effortless charm.” – Roger EbertA sun‑baked, off‑kilter caper starring Humphrey Bogart and directed by John Huston that breezily parodies the hard-boiled noirs and adventure films those two had made together, Beat the Devil is one of the most lovably eccentric films to emerge from the Golden Age of Hollywood. Bogart drifts through a tangle of schemers, dreamers, and double‑crossers played by the likes of Peter Lorre, Jennifer Jones, and Gina Lollobrigida, who set out on a crooked quest for African uranium only to get waylaid in a sleepy coastal Mediterranean town. Filmed on location in Naples and Ravello, Huston threw out the script on the first day and flew out Truman Capote to rewrite the whole thing on the fly. (Capote demanded daily phone calls with his pet raven, and one day when the raven refused to answer he flew to Rome to console it, delaying the production.) Boozy, mischievous, and deliriously chaotic, this oddball noir-comedy confounded audiences at the time, but it quickly earned a rabid cult following. Bogart, who’d sunk his own money into the production, once moaned, “Only phonies like it.” Well, count us as the ultimate phonies then, because we love it…and we think you will too!
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Event venue
Arkadin Cinema & Bar, 5228 Gravois Ave, St Louis, MO 63116-2310, United States, Southhampton
Tickets
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