In the fifty years since his death in 1957 Humphrey Bogart has firmly established his position as one of the iconic figures in the history of cinema, a star of the same magnitude as Monroe, Gable or Chaplin, and the personaification of one of Hollywood's most enduring genres, film noir. In this lavishly illsutrated survey of Bogart's life and work, Richard Schickel assesses his career and enduring legacy while George Perry provides a detailed review of the films he made over three decades, with a particular focus on his key roles. Published with the authorization of the Estate of Humphrey Bogart, this official celebration is a fitting tribute to a much-loved star. Having started out playing a series of supporting roles and "B" movie leads in routine gangster films, Bogart first emerged as a figure to be reckoned with inHigh Sierrabefore starring as the private eye Sam Spade inThe Maltese Falconin 1941. Then, two years later, cameCasablanca,the film in which, for the first time, he was allowed to show the humanity that lay behind the mask of the laconic, wisecracking tough guy. A humanity that was fully realized in the part of Charlie Allnut inThe African Queenfor which he won an Oscar in 1952. In all, Bogart appeared in over seventy-five films, and consistently lived up to his own definition of stardom -- "you have to drag your weight at the box office and be recognized wherever you go" -- and was later adopted as a cult figure by a new generation of fans, who saw him as an existentialist hero. Five decades after his death, he remains an invigorating presence in our imaginations. While Bogart's magnetism is to this day unmatched on screen, his private life was equally entrancing. He had already been married three times when he met Lauren Bacall on the set ofPassage to Marseilleand told her, "I saw your test. We're going to have a lot of fun together." She provided a much-needed stabilizing influence to his life and together they formed one of the most celebrated on- and off-screen couples. They had a son and daughter and appeared together in four movies includingKey LargoandThe Big Sleep. On the night Bogart won his Oscar forThe African Queen,Bacall reflected that "Bogie had everything now-- a happy marriage, a son, another child on the way, an ocean racing yacht [the legendarySantana], success, and the peak of recognition in his work."

STEPHEN BOGART is a television producer for Court TV. He also writes crime novels, and his memoir Bogart: In Search of My Father was published in 1995. He is married with three children. RICHARD SCHICKEL is a film critic, documentary film-maker and movie historian, who has written over thirty books, among them The Disney Version; D.W. Griffith: An American Life; Brando: A Life in Our Times; and a biography of Elia Kazan. His thirty documentaries include Charlie: The Life and Art of Charles Chaplin; Woody Allen: A Life in Film; and Shooting War, which is about combat cameramen in World War II. He has recently completed a documentary about Martin Scorsese and a reconstruction of Samuel Fuller's classic war film, The Big One, was named one of the year's Ten Best Films by the New York Times. He has been reviewing movies for Time since 1972 and writes a monthly column, 'Film on Paper', for the Los Angeles Times Book Review.  GEROGE PERRY is an author, broadcaster and former films editor at the Sunday Times, and has interviewed many of the greatest names in cinema. He has served or presided on film festival juries around the world, was President of the London Critics' Circle, and has written over thirty books, such as The Great British Picture Show and Forever Ealing, and definitive studies of Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals, The Complete Phantom of the Opera and Sunset Boulevard, as well as biographies of Rupert Bear, Monty Python, Miss Bluebell and James Dean.