When you look at some of the actors from the Golden Age who are still popular, people like John Wayne, Humphrey Bogart or Cary Grant, they all have one thing in common. They waited a long time to get their Oscars. Wayne waited until 1969, when he won Best Actor for True Grit. Grant never even won an Oscar for his work, waiting until 1970 for an honorary Oscar. Bogart, known today for his classic films of the 1940s, including The Maltese Falcon (1941), Casablanca (1942) and The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948), waited until 1951 to win his only Oscar. Bogart won for his fantastic role as Charlie Allnut in John Huston’s The African Queen, in which he starred alongside Katherine Hepburn, the most-honored actress by the Academy with four wins.
The African Queen is a pretty straightforward film, based on C.S. Forester’s novel of the same name. Rose Slayer (Hepburn) and her brother, Samuel (Robert Morley) are British Methodist missionaries in German East Africa just at the start of World War I in 1914. Charlie, who supplies them with mail and news from home, tells them about the war, but they decide to stay. Germans arrive to burn the village of natives near their mission and after they leave, Samuel suddenly becomes ill and dies. Charlie returns and is finally convinces Rose to leave, setting off on The African Queen. Rose and Charlie go on a series of adventures on a river. Charlie makes one simple mistake by telling Rose that a German gunboat named the Queen Louisa. He assumes that Rose would rather run away, but like so many other great Hepburn characters, she wants to do the opposite. She comes up with a preposterous idea to attack the gunboat head-on, using hand-made missiles. Along the way, the two fall in love and after going through what they went through, the audience can hardly blame them.
Like many Huston films, just making the movie itself was an adventure, since much of it was made on location in Africa. Like he did in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, Huston makes full use of the locations. However, unlike that fantastic black & white film, The African Queen has the great Jack Cardiff working the camera and shooting the beautiful scenery in Three-Strip Technicolor.
While some of the process shots might look a little hokey today, Hepburn and Bogart are so fantastic that these technical setbacks can be forgiven. Bogart may have deserved an Oscar for so many other great performances, but Mr. Allnut is one of his best creations. He adds multi-dimensionality to a man who could have been played as a straight-forward, cynical chump. What can be said about Hepburn though? She is as perfect as ever as the uptight Rose, a character who we see evolve over the course of the film’s length. The two have to carry the film, especially since about 90 percent of the time, they are the only two we see. There’s no need for strong supporting roles in The African Queen. Not only would there not be enough room for them on the boat, but Hepburn and Bogart are so good that it doesn’t matter.
The African Queen is one of the finest acting movies ever made. Huston got fantastic performances out of Bogart and Hepburn. The script by Huston and James Agee is endlessly quotable and the on-location footage shot by Cardiff fits seamlessly with the footage shot in England. This film is one exhilarating ride with two of the greatest actors Golden Hollywood ever produced.
In addition to Bogart’s win for Best Actor, the film received nominations for Best Actress, Best Directing and Best Adapted Screenplay.
By the way, how great was 1951? Bogart beat Marlon Brando, who was nominated for A Streetcar Named Desire, and Montgomery Clift, who was nominated for A Place in the Sun. Hepburn lost to Vivien Leigh for Streetcar, while Huston lost to George Stevens for A Place in the Sun.