David Goodis (1917–1967)

David Goodis’s Dark Passage is most famous today because of the WB film starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. Goodis sold the rights to film it for $25,000 and secured for himself immortality by doing so. To those who read, however, and especially those who enjoy a good crime noir, Goodis’s name would be known and bandied about during discussions of the genre, regardless.

Anyone familiar with the very good film based on the book knows that for the first forty minutes or so of the movie, we are in Parry’s (Bogart’s) shoes during the prison break and the ensuing escape. We never see Parry’s face during this portion of the film. Goodis’s entire novel is the equivalent of that portion of the film, the reader placed into Parry’s head, “hearing” him panic, reason out things, fight his fear and paranoia, and finally, figure out who killed his unfaithful wife and framed him for the murder.

Tightly constructed and narratively claustrophobic, Dark Passage is a unique narrative that won’t appeal to everyone. It is more likely to appeal to fans of the genre, and fans of the greatest writer of suspense, Cornell Woolrich. Goodis here seems to be influenced by Woolrich’s work. Parry even has an entire conversation in his head with his only friend, who has just been murdered, which is very Woolrichian.

One can almost picture Agnes Morehead as the shrill and annoying Madge Rapf, and Bacall as the lovely and lonely Irene, whose motives for helping Parry hide out at the outset, and later so that his face can heal when he has it altered, are at first unclear. Those motives will be seem more ambiguous for anyone who hasn’t seen the 40s film, but that’s not many.

There is loneliness here, and not just Parry’s, and there is that feeling of the little guy fighting against fate which permeated Woolrich’s work during this period. While Goodis doesn’t quite reach the level of Woolrich noir, this is very good, and there are moments when he comes close. A tricky and ultimately dooming confrontation with a guy referred to as Studebaker for much of the book, and the color of a car, set in motion an exciting conclusion. It is here, at the end, when Goodis throws the reader a Deadline at Dawn type of lifeline that makes this a memorable read.

While the narrative style of nearly every thought in Parry’s head can become too overblown at times, at other times it’s marvelous, both cerebrally claustrophobic and entertainingly mesmerizing. This seminal noir novel will have you looking up Patavilca, Peru on your globe, and wondering…

Because Goodis seemed to be channeling Woolrich, but didn’t quite reach that lofty plateau, this is 4.5 stars for me. But it is such a terrific read, I’m rounding up. A unique novel (unless you’ve read Woolrich), and like Woolrich, not for everyone. Fans of 1940s and '50s noir/suspense, however, must have a go at it to sample the full spectrum of what the genre has to offer.… (mais)