monday, june 09, 2008
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
he Treasure of the Sierra Madre towers over modern film like few other movies in history. Its influence, direct or indirect, makes it a Rosetta Stone for unlocking the ethical underpinnings of almost every film examining the murky depths of man's own shaky morality in the modern world.The story of the trio of prospectors, Fred C. Dobbs (Humphrey Bogart), Bob Curtin (Tim Holt) and the grizzled old veteran Howard (Walter Huston) searching for their fortune in the rugged and ruthless mountains of Central Mexico during the 1920s has lost not a whit of its power in the six decades since it's release.
Bogart and the film's director John Huston first joined forces in the classic film-noir thriller The Maltese Falcon. The success of that film made the actor a star and gave Huston the directorial clout to undertake the more unorthodox The Treasure of Sierra Madre.Film critic Roger Ebert once praised the The Maltese Falcon as a beautiful synthesis of image, action and dialogue and this mastery of the medium extends seamlessly into The Treasure of Sierra Madre. If anything, Huston moves beyond the confines of his previous work as he brings the camera out of the studio and into the world at large.
Ostensibly a Western, The Treasure of Sierra Madre spends more of it's time breaking the conventions of genre rather than adhering to them. In many ways it is su generis - a work that stands apart and has its own distinct lineage of works influenced by it.
Watching The Treasure of Sierra Madre today often proves a battle against its fantastic success. It's pervasive impact spawned a legion of successors that one has to consciously distance themselves from to see the film on its own terms.
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By far the film's most imposing successor is Stephen Spielberg's Raiders of the Lost Ark. The 1980 film is heavily influenced by Huston's film to the point where whole scenes are pretty much copied in the latter work.
Obviously, Raiders of the Lost Ark isn't a remake of the 1948 film but the parallels between the two are unmistakable, particularly when it comes to Dobbs. Indiana Jones not only is crowned with a version of his predecessor's distinctive hat but also a bit of Dobb's questionable ethics as well.
(Similarly the next film of the franchise, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, was clearly inspired by George Stevens 1939 film Gunga Din although much less successfully.)
For both, the chapeau is a visible reminder of the inner man. Dobbs sports a beaten and worn hat that is notable by its distinctive hole. Jones's, by contrast, is dusty and weatherbeaten but clearly intact. It's an association that holds true for all the characters in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. Curtin's hat isn't nearly as abused, nor is his ethical compass, as well. Howard eschews a hat most of the film but, when he wears one, it's intact as Curtin's.
In fact, throughout the film, hats are a hallmark of civilized society and the ethical systems they entail, to the point that those wishing to assume the guise of respectability do so under the shade of a distinctive brim. The rural folk doff their hats in respect while the bandit even holds up his execution to redon his distinctive - and obviously symbolic - golden sombrero.
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The Treasure of Sierra Madre is such a powerful cinematic effort due to the conscious yet subtle use of imagery and symbolism to reinforce its themes. Particularly evident are the elements - fire, earth, air and, most importantly, water. In fact, water flows through the film as a source of meaning as much as gold does.
Howard says as much when he chastises Dobbs and Curtin for overreacting when they think they've struck it rich but only found fool's gold
"Next time you boys strike it rich holler for me before you start splashin' water around," he says. Water's precious, sometimes it can be more precious than gold."
Dobbs buys the winning ticket from the boy he douses with water, the two men earn the money for their venture by passing over the water then they decide to become prospectors cleaning themselves in a fountain. It's even the key for prying the precious metal from the earth.
In the end Dobbs - carrying the whole of the fortune - meets his fate at a creek which he has plunged himself into and left himself vulnerable to the bandits. Curtin and Howard find the element more sustaining and their fate, by contrast, is left to the winds.
Children are also a conspicuous element to the tale. They pop up in critical points throughout The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and the way the characters interact with them carries vast importance on their fates. This may be because of they possess a type of ethical innocence that places an additional burden on adults to protect them.
Dobbs, for example, begins the film by being bested by a child for the remainder of a cigarette tossed casually in the street. For the boy it's a brief moment to enjoy a luxury of adulthood, for Dobbs it's one more indignity that underscores his impoverishment.
Thus, after panhandling for a peso, he purchases his own cigarettes and then treats a young boy selling lottery tickets with scorn, throwing a glass of water in his face.
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Eventually the child eventually prevails and sells Dobbs ticket number 13, which will prove to be the key to his fate and his fortune - for better and for worse.
It is the pursuit of that fortune that impels Dobbs to action and the idea that it is a function of chance in achieving it is a key tenet in the works of B. Traven - the mysterious author who penned the original novel from which the film was derived.
Almost all of B. Traven's works expressed a tension between the mores of a capitalist society and the ethical core of men, to the point where his conclusions verge on anarchist. It's a sentiment that emerges in the film version of The Treasure of the Sierra Madre but John Huston's concerns seem to be focused elsewhere.
Howard's explanation for the worth of gold in the flophouse is a brilliant bit of shorthand socialism - the value is due to the sum of the labor needed to acquire it
"An ounce of gold, mister, is worth what it is because of the human labor that went into the findin' and the gettin' of it," he says.
It's a short step to draw a moral conclusion that the one man who profits does so at the expense the 999 who failed. Yet, Howard doesn't draw this conclusion. He's sanguine about the plight of the worker and prepared to throw in his lot with chance.
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They opt for the latter and from there the divisions between them begin to grow. Yet, Howard still seems to stand apart from the growing conflict between his compatriots. Unlike his two companions, he's fully aware of the odds against him and he's prepared to withstand the pain of failure if that's what happens.
Experience has taught him to laugh and he laughs when he finds the gold and he laughs when he loses it. The key is that he isn't focused on the wealth itself but rather what it can obtain for him. His real desire is to be able to live out the remainder of his life in a degree of leisure and respectability.
Curtin is similar in his desires. His recollections of his youth fuel a desire for the sense of community he felt living as a fruit grower and the well being it gives him to make things prosper. Yet the desire to possess wealth clearly isn't without its power over him as he hesitates to aid Dobbs after the cave in demonstrates.
For both, the gold is the means to the ends. For Dobbs, the gold is the ends itself. Being wealthy is his goal. Having the power to purchase what he wants is what he focuses on and that means having sufficient funds to accomplish it.
"I need dough and plenty of it," he says and he certainly means it.
- "I got it all figured out what I'm going to do. First I'm going to a Turkish bath to sweat and soak and get all the grime out of my system. Then I'm going to a haberdasher and get a brand new set of duds. A dozen of everything. And then I'm going to a swell cafe and order everything on the menu. And if it ain't just right, and maybe even if it is, I'm gonna bawl the waiter out and make him take the whole thing back."
Yet, it's a zero-sum game. The power lasts only as long as the wealth lasts and, thus, his desire to stay at the mine as long as possible and cull as large a fortune from the mountain as is possible.
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Even before he set out, Dobbs sealed his fate observing that "Gold don't carry any curse with it. It all depends on whether or not the guy who finds it is the right guy. The way I see it gold can be as much of a blessing as a curse." As profound as his observation was, he lacked the self-awareness to see how prophetic it would be.
For Dobbs, his desire for a fortune at all costs feeds of a latent selfishness and finally, fed by the growing pile of gold, blossoms into full blown pleonexy and from there it's just a whistle stop to madness.
Pushed to the point of murder, Dobbs finds himself on the edge of abyss. The plague of conscience ends up torturing Dobbs but it's more than just that. With nothing inside him to ground his being the only thing he has when the illusions are stripped away is the abyss.
Within the confines of the city - within a 'civilized' system holding them in check - the moral code is clear to them. They attempt to find profit in regular ways according to accepted norms. But their attempt to obtain regular jobs ends with them being preyed upon by an unscrupulous foreman (Barton MacLane). They system, it seems, is rigged against them.
When they confront the foreman it's an interesting moral impasse. They attack and eventually overwhelm him but then Dobbs only takes the amount they are owed and throws the rest on his face. He even pays the bartender for the drinks and expense.
The moral conflict gets more difficult to traverse the longer they are in the wild and the possible fortune grows. They find themselves violating regular moral norms although fate relieves them of final responsibility for their actions.
For example, the three make a conscious choice to kill an innocent man, the lone prospector James Cody (Bruce Bennett). That the attack by the bandits intercedes and takes the man's life is accidental - they already violated an ethical absolute.
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There is a brutal cynicism at work in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre but there is also a firm belief in humanity as well. Despite the dark imagery and unpleasant truths it conveys there is a sense of redemption in the end, a belief that there is a redeeming element to the world if we choose to accept it.
"You know, the worst ain't so bad when it finally happens," Curtin tells Howard at the end of their adventure. "Not half as bad as you figure it'll be before it's happened."
Which is a good point, as long as you are alive enough to utter it.
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