In the wake of her death, we take a trip down the star-studded lane of Lauren Becall’s iconic career on screen. Vibrant, doe-eyed and sultry, the classic American beauty spent years enthralling audiences with her trademark husky voice and ‘that look’. A symbol of the hallowed golden age of old world cinema, the vintage star was the last female actress of the studio-system era, embodying the period with as much grace and beauty as she did every role.
RESCU’s Top 5 Edit of Lauren Becall’s Best Films
1. To Have and Have Not (1944)
In her breakout role, Becall plays Marie ‘Slim’ Browning, an American pick pocket stranded at a French hotel. The film’s enduring popularity is primarily – if not solely – due to the sizzling chemistry between Bogart and Bacall, especially in the legendary ‘You know how to whistle, don’t you?’ iconic scene.
2. The Big Sleep (1946)
Becall and Bogart’s on screen romance continued to sizzle in the crime thriller ‘The Big Sleep’. The plot is dense and complicated, but Becall steals the show as usual and is irresistibly watchable.
3. Key Largo (1948)
Tumoltuous relationships play out as a hurricanes approaches when a man visits his old friend’s hotel and finds a gangster running things. Becall plays Nora Temple opposite her eventual husband Humphrey Bogart once again.
4. The Shootist (1976)
Proving she can shoot a hit without her husband, Becall stars in the tale of a man desperately searching for the most honorable and least painful way to die.
5. How to Marry a Millionaire (1953)
Bacall eventually moved out of the noire genre, starring alongside Marilyn Monroe in the feisty female comedy How to Marry a Millionaire, where three women set about to find themselves rich husbands, but get distracted by love along the way…
See that iconic look across her greatest films below:
