Classic shmassic. If anything, The African Queen stands as testament to the poverty of having a budget: When Powell and Pressburger wanted the Himalayas, they retreated to their London studio, turning lurid backdrop shooting into the approximation of a fever dream. Huston meanwhile, with the facility to fly a cast to Africa, trails the heart of darkness, and returns with a video-diarist’s program of interests: So that what you get are turgid shots a-plenty of wildlife dopily standing around, the light a flat, unchanging, democratic blue. Nevertheless, the area’s elements, in all their scintillating dullness, prove enough to transform Hepburn from tight-buttoned choirgirl into rope-gnashin’ first mate, as she charts the titular vessel on its course to blow up German ship, the Louisa. That she ends up in Bogart’s arms along the way seems less a question of revelation than reflex: the changeover gradated with the suddenness of a cough. Yet, for all the boxing-match hype surrounding their pairoff, genuine rapport becomes a one-note engine, driven by the sight of Bogart again and again falling playvictim to Hepburn’s butch lack of compromise. With so little to feed on, the two are inadvertantly reduced to signifiers; which means that Huston does finally stumble on an undertow of decay – that of his own stars. And would it be too much to say that, once Bogart begins fighting off a swarm of insects darting the screen (and resembling print scratches more than insects), it's like an outtake from Bill Morrison’s Decasia, the actor staving off the inevitable demise of his own image?—David Levinson