It was almost love at first sight when the moody tough guy played opposite a young, beautiful actress called Lauren Bacall.

Screen luminaries Lauren Bacall (Dogville), Anjelica Huston (The Royal Tenenbaums) and Terence Stamp (Superman II)

Screen luminaries Lauren Bacall (Dogville), Anjelica Huston (The Royal Tenenbaums) and Terence Stamp (Superman II)

Afflicted with a terminal illness, John Bernard Brooks (John Wayne), the last of the legendary gunfighters, quietly returns to Carson City for medical attention from his old friend Dr. Hostetler (James Stewart). Aware that his days are numbered, the troubled man seeks solace and peace in a boarding house run by a widow (Lauren Bacall) and her son (Ron Howard). However, it is not Brook's fate to die in peace, as he becomes embroiled in one last valiant battle.

Traveling across America with her father (Willem Dafoe), Grace (Bryce Dallas Howard) comes to discover the isolated plantation of Manderlay - a place whose inhabitants do not know that slavery has been abolished. Outraged to discover that the plantation's owner, Mam (Lauren Bacall), not only employs slaves but also refuses to open their eyes to the truth, Grace fights against all odds to free the slaves of Manderlay, who include Wilhelm (Danny Glover), the old house servant and the two-faced, rebellious Timothy (Isaach De Bankole). This Cannes Golden Palm nominated drama is from the innovative Danish director and screenwriter, Lars von Trier and also features Chloe Sevigny and John Hurt.

Lauren Bacall more or less plays herself in The Fan. Cast as famous Broadway musical comedy star Sally Ross (with an astonishing lack of temperament!), Bacall finds herself the unwilling love object of psychotic fan Douglas Breen (Michael Biehn). As security around Ross tightens, Breen vows that if he can't have Ross, no one else can. James Garner and Maureen Stapleton are underused as, respectively, Bacall's ex-husband and mother-hen secretary. Based on a good novel by Bob Randall, The Fan comes off as a slightly more expensive stalker of the week TV movie. Still, the film proved grimly prescient in the light of John Lennon's assassination (which occurred after the film was completed, but before its release) and the ongoing dilemma of current Broadway stars (even the lesser lights) who are forced to hire bodyguards to protect them from worshipful wackos. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide.

A remake of 1933's The Greeks Had a Word for Them, as well as a retread of 20th Century-Fox's favorite plotline, How to Marry a Millionaire was the first Hollywood comedy to be lensed in Cinemascope. Lauren Bacall, Betty Grable and Marilyn Monroe play three models of modest means who rent an expensive Manhattan penthouse apartment and pose as women of wealth. It's all part of a scheme hatched by Bacall to snare rich husbands for herself and her roommates. The near-sighted Monroe is wooed by an international playboy, but ends up settling for the tax-dodging fugitive (David Wayne) who owns the girls' apartment. The knuckle-headed Grable goes off on an illicit weekend in the mountains with a grouchy married executive (Fred Clark), but falls instead for a comparatively poor--but very handsome--forest ranger (Rory Calhoun). And Bacall very nearly lands an aging millionaire (William Powell), but has a sudden attack of conscience and opts instead for the supposedly poverty-stricken chap (Cameron Mitchell) who has be

Lauren Bacall hosts this TV-special roundup of Hollywood's most celebrating kissing scenes Ms. Bacall should be an authority on screen kisses: during her long career, she was well and fully smooched by the likes of John Wayne, Gregory Peck, Charles Boyer...and, of course, her first husband, Humphrey Bogart. The collection begins with the 1896 Edison vignette The Kiss, takes us through the torrid twenties (Garbo et. al.), muses over the censorship rules of the 1930s and 1940s (when kisses could last no longer than 3 seconds), breezes through the anything-goes 1960s and 1970s, and closes with current choice examples of cinematic busses. There's no real point to the film, but it's nice to have around. At 47 minutes, Kisses is just long enough to avoid the wearing out of welcome. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide.

The definitive Humphrey Bogart/Lauren Bacall vehicle, The Big Sleep casts Bogart as Raymond Chandler's cynical private eye Philip Marlowe. Summoned to the home of the fabulously wealthy General Sternwood (Charles Waldron), Marlowe is hired to deal with a blackmailer shaking down the General's sensuous, thumb-sucking daughter Carmen (Martha Vickers). This earns Marlowe the displeasure of Carmen's sloe-eyed, seemingly straight-laced older sister Vivian (Bacall), who is fiercely protective of her somewhat addled sibling. As he pursues the case at hand, Marlowe gets mixed up in the murder of Arthur Geiger (Theodore von Eltz), a dealer in pornography. He also runs afoul of gambling-house proprietor Eddie Mars (John Ridgely), who seems to have some sort of hold over the enigmatic Vivian. Any further attempts to outline the plot would be futile: the storyline becomes so complicated and convoluted that even screenwriters William Faulkner, Leigh Brackett, and Jules Furthmann were forced to consult Raymond Chandler for

With Woody Harrelson and Lauren Bacall.