It's an impossible ask but try to forget that other picture - it's like comparing a painting with a piece of music - different things altogether.
This actually has the Wow factor! It's a great story - it has a beginning, a mass of confusion and then an end with a satisfying easy to understand explanation for everything. There's so much happening all of the time but Roy del Ruth presents it all nicely in order so everything follows. As with a lot of early 30s pictures, the story telling is simpler and less sophisticated they would become a few years later but that clarity of dealing with one thing at a time makes it easier to focus on each individual as they're presented and discover their character. Even with that simple premise, because the plot of THE MALTESE FALCON is essentially layers of lies upon lies obscuring more lies, the task of working out who they really are and what makes these characters tick isn't particularly easy but all the more rewarding when you do get to know them.
Sam Spade is played by Ricardo Cortez and he's an absolute superstar. He clearly loved doing this role, he plays it with such enthusiasm and energy that his joy floods out of the screen like a tsunami at you so much, you just can't help sharing his enjoyment.
There's a lot of imagery in this production (and the book): Cortez' Sam Spade is very much a reflection of the Maltese Falcon itself: something hidden in disguise, something pretending it's something else, something smooth, slippery and superficial on the outside hiding something secret, never to be revealed under that hard shell. Ricardo Cortez' Spade is the slick, smart, sophisticated man about town with beautiful clothes, a beautiful apartment and a different beautiful woman in his beautiful apartment every beautiful night. As this film progresses you're privileged to catch a few glimpses of the real Sam Spade. Ricardo Cortez is perfect as the smiling debonair THIN MAN type of detective, along with all the lies upon lies of the story, his own character is clearly a complete fabrication. Maybe this is a perfect role for him because Ricardo Cortez himself is kind of just an act, in real life he'd originally been Jacob Krantz - ah, the masks of Hollywood! ........did I say earlier that pictures from this era weren't sophisticated......clearly I wasn't entirely correct.
This isn't a perfect picture by any means. Unlike Rouben Mamoulian's CITY STREETS also made in 1931 but by the much wealthier Paramount Pictures or even BLONDE CRAZY made by Roy del Ruth himself but six months later, this film does show its age. Technology was evolving so fast just in that one year that you can see and hear the difference in quality from this to BLONDE CRAZY. What is noticeably clunky about this is how slow and precise the talking is. The actors sound like they are talking extra slow carefully in that strange, over-enunciated voice we think makes us understandable to foreigners or to our Alexa! This has the knock on effect of slowing down the action and so some of the energy gets a little lost at times. This is a flaw but a forgivable one and it doesn't ruin the film - it almost gives it some sort of charm.
So what about the rest of the cast? Bebe Daniels has almost as much screen time as Sam Spade and apart from that peculiar accent she employs she is THE classic, THE ultimate femme fatale (and ten times more believable than Mary Astor). She's absolutely untrustworthy but also absolutely adorable. You would know with complete, one hundred percent certainty that without any doubt whatsoever she would stab you in the back but you also know that with just as much certainty you would definitely fall in love with her. And that's what happens two fake personas fall in love with each other but what about the real people underneath? Like we see the superficial nature of Sam Spade starting to flake away, Bebe Daniels' character Ruth also begins to slip as well. She however reveals herself to be more like the fake bird, the one that's got nothing inside it rather than the real Maltese Falcon. Deep stuff but fun!
And talking of revealing herself, I wonder whether that was the same bath Roy del Ruth had Miss Daniels in which he also had Joan Blondell in a few months later. Was that part of the deal for doing one of his pictures - nice one Roy, I like your style!
