Beat the Devil

John Huston’s Beat the Devil stars Humphrey Bogart as Billy Dannreuther, the front man for a group of swindlers stranded in an Italian port town, scheming to take ownership of uranium-rich land in Africa. Also stranded is a naive British couple, Mr. and Mrs. Chelm (Edward Underdown and Jennifer Jones). Flirtations and a web of lies ensue among the group, testing romantic loyalty and allegiances among them.

Beat the Devil (1953) starring Humphrey Bogart, Gina Lollobrigida, Edward Underdown, Jennifer Jones, Robert Morley, Peter Lorre

Peterson: You mean Mrs. Chelm is an unqualified liar?
Billy Dannreuther: Well, let’s say she uses her imagination rather than her memory.

Product Description 

Offbeat is the only way to describe this John Huston/Truman Capote collaboration-the script’s unusual qualities perhaps due partly to the fact it was being written even as the film was being shot-about a ragtag group of con men out to swindle each other while on a Mediterranean cruise. Humphrey Bogart (who helped finance the film) and Gina Lollobrigida play a married couple whose adulterous urges figure into the complex, loosey-goosey plot. Jennifer Jones, Robert Morley, and Peter Lorre co-star. 89 min.

Editorial review of Beat the Devil courtesy of Amazon.com

In this sly satire on British imperialist pretensions, Billy Dannreuther (Humphrey Bogart) receives a confidential tip regarding uranium mines in Kenya. He devises a scheme to buy up the land as cheaply as possible, but his corrupt plans are temporarily stalled by a transportation problem. While Dannreuther and his wife Maria (Gina Lollobrigida) wait in Italy for repairs to be made to the steamer headed for Africa, they are joined by other adventurers who also have their eyes on the valuable property: the young, upper-class englishman Harry Chelm (Edward Underdown), his neglected wife Gwendolen (Jennifer Jones), and a quartet of international crooks consisting of Peterson (Robert Morley), Julius O’Hara (Peter Lorre), Ravello (Marco Tulli), and Major Jack Ross (Ivor barnard). They’re all terrified of being discovered, especially since one of them is a hired killer on the run!

Cast of characters

• Humphrey Bogart (We’re No Angels) … Billy Dannreuther
• Jennifer Jones (Love Is a Many Splendored Thing) … Gwendolen Chelm
• Gina Lollobrigida (Solomon and Sheba) … Maria Dannreuther
• Robert Morley (The Old Dark House 1963) … Peterson
• Peter Lorre (Arsenic and Old Lace) … Julius O’Hara
• Edward Underdown … Harry Chelm
• Ivor Barnard … Maj. Jack Ross
• Marco Tulli … Ravello
• Bernard Lee (The Third Man) … Insp. Jack Clayton
• Mario Perrone … Purser on SS Nyanga
• Giulio Donnini … Administrator
• Saro Urzì … Captain of SS Nyanga (as Saro Urzi)
• Juan de Landa … Hispano-Suiza Driver
• Aldo Silvani … Charles