# Petrified Forest, The (1936)

### reviewed by
Mark O'Hara

    The Petrified Forest (1936)

Who reads plays by Robert Sherwood anymore? Or watches movies starring a young Humphrey Bogart and Bette Davis?

    A good deal of people, I am sure!  And if they don't, they oughtta!

About the only thing corny about the film is that use of period slang, a mix of tough-guy talk and early-century cuteness.

Otherwise THE PETRIFIED FOREST is a heavyweight. One thing a viewer cannot miss is Sherwood's themes. Modern man stranded in a lonely world that is reverting to savagery. Intellectuals being cursed by endless self-reflection. American individualism, the hallmark of settlers of North America since the Puritans, disappearing. The worship of big-name criminals. These topics surface again and again, and the director, Archie L. Mayo, manages to keep the focus on the action: ideas do not overshadow plot.

The man mostly likely to be named protagonist is Alan Squier, played by British actor Leslie Howard. He's hiking along the vast Arizona desert as the action begins, cars passing him in the dust. Meanwhile the exposition shows us a forsaken service station and diner in far-out-of-the-way Black Mesa. Gabrielle (Bette Davis) waits tables here for her father, the owner, and a young, brash gas attendant Boze (Dick Foran) tries hard to make her fall in love with him. In short order, the hiker shows up. He's a writer, a novelist manqué, a man made cynical by the world but refreshed by the innocence of a pretty waitress who reads Francois Villon and craves to visit France, where her mother traveled after abandoning the family.

Though it takes awhile for action to start, we get plenty of it when Duke Mantee and his gang arrive at the isolated café. We have heard foreshadowing radio reports that Mantee has escaped, so when he appears, he is larger than life. Gaby's grandpa – a talky geezer who supplies much comic relief – has talked about being one of the first to settle the territory 56 years before. Billy the Kid was an acquaintance of his, and we understand Americans' fascination with infamous names. We don't know if Mantee's character will escape, or get gunned down like the outlaw William Bonney, but Mantee does keep our attention while he stirs our repulsion.

What's at the heart of the story is human courage. Alan Squier has the courage – called insanity by fellow characters – to make a large sacrifice for Gabrielle, who he has met only hours before. And Duke Mantee, though he hides behind his guns for much of the movie, shows a kind of courage at the climax. It's good to have convictions, Sherwood is preaching to us, but it's better to act upon them. The catalyst for all this bravery is human love and decency.

Bogart scored a large success for the Mantee role. He and Howard were reprising the same roles from Broadway (Sherwood's play garnered the 1935 Pulitzer Prize), and Bogart sealed his reputation with a naturalistic performance as a tough but still likable gangster.

Bette Davis is excellent as well. The beauty of youth is upon her here, and the performance is believable and strong – as good or better than actor of her time.

Howard is a natural as the disillusioned writer. He's a sort of washed up, world-weary youngster – in his mid-thirties, as he states that he was just too young to have fought in the Great War. (Another theme here: the war was something glorious to have fought in, and those too young missed out on the opportunity to become real men…) Like Davis, Howard knew when to understate his character, and the result is a noble if misguided drifter.

The screenplay by Charles Kenyon and Delmer Daves is talky, but at least the writers have preserved Robert Emmet Sherwood's magnificent and satirical ideas. Between the World Wars was a tough time, and the coverage of ideas in THE PETRIFIED FOREST explains clearly the political and social controversies of the day.

So it's a darn good watch for two reasons – the playwright's agenda and the actors' top-notch performances.

83 minutes, Black and White, not rating, though a modern PG, probably.

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