Key Largo

Key Largo (1948) is John Huston's tight crime noir, and you can watch it online on iFILM. War veteran Frank McCloud arrives at a rundown hotel in the Florida Keys to pay respects to the widow and father of a soldier who died under his command.

The place has already been taken over. Running it is gangster Johnny Rocco (Edward G. Robinson), a deported Prohibition kingpin who has slipped back into the country with his crew. The guests become hostages, a hurricane is bearing down on the island, and there's nowhere to run. Frank (Humphrey Bogart) is reluctant to play hero — the war drained that out of him. Lauren Bacall plays the widow Nora, and Lionel Barrymore is her wheelchair-bound father-in-law, the only one who won't flinch in front of the mob boss.

Huston traps the whole story inside the muggy hotel, and the storm outside only cranks up the pressure within. Claire Trevor, as Rocco's washed-up boozy girlfriend, took the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for it — the scene where he makes her sing for a drink is worth the price of admission alone. It's the last of the four films Bogart and Bacall made together. A lean, sweaty black-and-white pressure cooker for fans of old-school noir. Stream Key Largo (1948) online on iFILM.