Maltese Falcon

After two previous film versions of {|Dashiell Hammett|}'s detective classic The Maltese Falcon, Warner Bros. finally got it right in 1941-- or, rather, {|John Huston|}, a long-established screenwriter making his directorial debut, got it right, simply by adhering as closely as possible to the original. Taking over from a recalcitrant {|George Raft|}, {|Humphrey Bogart|} achieved true stardom as Sam Spade, a hard-boiled San Francisco private eye who can be as unscrupulous as the next guy …