DARK PASSAGE (1946) Noir-thing like a good whodunit

If you’re a falsely accused wife-killer on the lam and get plastic surgery to mask your identity, seems like the last face you’d want is Bogart’s. But that’s how DARK PASSAGE gets rolling, and for the balance of this little noir gem - set in a pulp-fiction Frisco where it's dark even when the sun is up - Vincent Parry (Bogie) murders twice (in self defense) to prove he's not a murderer. Watch for an over-the-top performance by Agnes Moorehead as the nasty, scheming friend of Vincent’s dead ex - so over the top, you wonder why she doesn't get a nosebleed. A fun whodunit, with the usual noir twists. (Trivia notes: Lauren Bacall plays the young woman who provides aid and comfort to Bogart. This was their third movie together. They were wed shortly before production began, and stayed together until his death at 57 in '57. And speaking of coupling up ... toward the end of the movie we see a quick shot of a bus driver, played by a young, unbilled actor named John Agar. Two years later Agar shared the screen in the Ford/Wayne classic FORT APACHE (1948) with a teenager who soon would become his bride, Shirley Temple. Throughout the stormy, five-year marriage, Agar - poor man, poorer actor - was known in Hollywood as Mister Shirley Temple.)