Joel Cairo

Joel Cairo is a major antagonist of the 1929 Dashiell Hammett novel The Maltese Falcon, and its 1941 film adaptation of the same name. He's a partner and companion in Mr. Gutman's criminal trio, along with Wilmer Cook.

He was portrayed by, who also played Signor Ugarte.

Encountering Spade
He's introduced in the story as he walks into Sam Spade's office and talks about the murder of Sam's partner. He fondles his cane and also asks if there is any relationship between Archer's and Thursby's death. He is searching for a statuette of The titular Maltese Falcon.

Cairo offers Spade the sum of $5,000 for the bird's recovery on behalf of the figure's "rightful owner." After Effie -- Spade's secretary -- leaves the outer office for the night and Spade turns away for a moment, Cairo surprises and threatens Spade in his office with a drawn gun while politely telling Spade to put his hands behind his neck. Cairo checks to see if Sam is armed, but Spade catches Cairo off guard, and easily disarms him and knocks him out cold with one quick punch to the jaw. While Cairo is unconscious on the sofa, Spade emptied his pockets' contents.

Cairo suddenly regained consciousness and looks at his face in a mirror, but Spade's image is all that the mirror reflects. Upset, Cairo whines that his shirt is ruffled. Without missing a beat, Cairo re-states his offer to pay $5,000 for the figure's return, but is confused by Spade's defense of his office space since the bird wasn't there. Cairo apologizes for not divulging the identity of the bird's owner or the statuette itself. Spade demands a retainer of $200.00 for assisting Cairo in locating the bird.

Spade states he doesn't have the black bird, or know where it is (or where he can get it), but would agree to be hired, for a profit, to obtain it in a way that didn't harm anyone. Cairo informs Spade that he is staying at the Hotel Belvedere, Room 635 and can be contacted there. As he prepares to leave, Cairo tells Spade he expected a great benefit from their association.

Spade gives Cairo his gun back who pulls the gun on him again. He persists in his demands to search Spade's office for the much-desired black bird despite being roughed up. Spade looks on in amusement, laughing at him.

Brigid and Cairo
Later that night, Brigid continues to force Spade into protecting her, and agrees to speak to Cairo.

Spade phones and leaves a message at Cairo's hotel to meet them in his apartment later that evening. After a wipe left dissolve, they take a cab there. Brigid (wearing the fur that she said she would pawn) and Spade walk by an expectant Iva furtively waiting for him (the spectre of Miles' death trails him everywhere) in a black convertible parked out front.

Cairo joined the group and greeted Brigid with fake compliments. They spoke about Cairo's $5,000 cash offer for the Maltese Falcon and the bird's whereabouts. After admitting that she hasn't "got the Falcon," Brigid promised that she will have it back in about a week from where Floyd Thursby hid it. She claimed that she is selling the bird and disposing of it because she is fearful of the bird's deadly trail and how it led to Thursby's murder. As they guardedly discuss their past dealings with references to the "Fat Man", Cairo gets tense when Brigid mentions he's in San Francisco and she gets excited when he repeats a warning about "the boy outside" (Wilmer, who was spying on the conversion from the outside.) Cairo and Brigid openly detest and mutually insult each other.

Brigid reaches for the gun as they are interrupted by loud knocking at the door and the sound of the buzzer. In the hallway, Spade talks to police detectives Polhaus and Dundy in a second after-hours call. The cops are there because Iva Archer—Miles' wife—has informed them that Spade was romantically involved with her and killed Miles to marry her.

The police tried to enter the room, but Spade blocks the doorway. Just as they are about to leave, they hear a scuffle inside between O'Shaughnessy and Cairo. Spade is forced to let the cops in and they barge into the apartment where a fracas in progress. They witness a bloodied, whining Joel Cairo complaining that Spade brutally entrapped him in the apartment where Brigid attacked him and was threatening to kill him. Dundy stands between the two antagonists as he listens to their conflicting versions and explanations of what happened. When Brigid counter-accuses Cairo of lying and then kicks him, Dundy threatens to run everyone into the police station. To extricate them from a possible jailing, Spade explains their rough interrogation of Cairo - a story consistent with their somewhat limited knowledge.

The police still threaten to take them away, but Spade further jokes that the theatrics were all planned. He presses his explanation, exaggerating their conflict and making an intimidated Cairo confess that his questioning was all a joke.

One of the officers tries to punch Spade, but Brigid and Cairo back Spade up, preferring not to press charges against each other, since that would involve them further with the police - and compromise their ability to swiftly search for the falcon. Then, the bewildered police have no choice but to leave, even though they want to get contact information for both Brigid and Cairo. Cairo leaves the room along with the officers exhausted from getting beat up by Brigid.

Hotel Belvedere
The next day at Hotel Belvedere, Spade enters the hotel, uses the desk phone and asks to speak to Cairo. Sam spots him again sitting in a lobby chair facing away from him and reading a newspaper. Sam hangs up the phone and sits down next to the 'boy' - Wilmer. Deducing from the vague conversation between Brigid and Cairo that the "boy" was hired by either the 'Fat Man' or Cairo to follow him, he delivers a message to the gunsel's boss.

Incited to anger, Wilmer responds with "shove off," and ineffectually threatens Sam to back off or he would hurt him. Spade reprimands him, telling the young, insulting thug that he should be polite. He then signals the house detective Luke to run Wilmer, wearing an oversized overcoat, out of the hotel lobby. As Wilmer is rousted out, Spade blows smoke in his face.

Just then, a beaten-up, disheveled and tired Cairo returns to the hotel lobby. Spade confronts him and explains his motives to him.

Cairo was roughed up during questioning in the all-night police grilling, but he didn't talk - except to repeat Spade's unreasonable story. He pleads to be left alone so that he wouldn't be further mussed up.

The Fat Man
Spade meets up with Mr. Gutman in his hotel suite, and Spade throws a fit at him since Gutman refused to reveal what he knew about the falcon. Spade leaves the room, and enters a descending elevator just as Cairo steps off the other ascending car without seeing him.

During Spade's second encounter with Mr. Gutman, the obese man explains the history and importance of the black bird and then afterwards, drugs Spade with a knockout drug, which allows him and his partners to depart searching for the black bird.

The Gang's All Together
Spade gets ahold of the Maltese Falcon and Brigid sets him up, by calling Sam making him think she's in danger. She leads Sam to his San Francisco apartment where Gutman, Cairo and Wilmer are in the living room waiting for them. Cleverly, he brings together the alliance of self-interested, greedy falcon-seekers to find out the true story. Wilmer wants to frisk Spade, but Spade wouldn't let him. Gutman gets Wilmer to put down the gun and leave Spade alone. Tempted by the financial allure of the bird, Spade asks for his first payment for the falcon - Gutman tests Spade and hands him an envelope with $10,000 - less than the $25,000 promised earlier. Gutman stated the money was the "genuine coin of the realm" and that he can buy ten dollars of talk with one of his dollars. Spade then decides to use Wilmer as a "fall guy" and blame him for Captain's and Thursby's deaths. Initially, Mr. Gutman refused to hand over Wilmer, since he thought he would tell the police all the details about the falcon, but Sam didn't think they'd believe him. Sam reassures Brigid who sits nervously to the side, telling her everything would be fine. Gutman calls of Wilmer again, getting Spade to suggest other fall-guy alternatives. One of these alternatives was Joel Cairo. Eventually they agreed on selling Wilmer out to be the fall guy.

The Interrogation
Spade demanded answers from Mr. Gutman about the events that happened earlier. He then explained various points.
 * Brigid left the falcon with Captain Jacobi in Hong Kong and came to San Francisco with Floyd Thursby. Thursby was Brigid's loyal ally - so killing Thursby would be an intimidating show of force for Brigid and persuade her to ally with them. Gutman had tried to make a deal with Thursby before "giving him the works". He spoke to Thursby the night of his death, but failed to reach an agreement, so Wilmer followed him back to the hotel.
 * Captain Jacobi's death was Brigid's fault. She (and Thursby) manipulated Gutman and Cairo in Istanbul, Turkey. She fled with him from Turkey to Hong Kong (and then to the US) - trailed by everyone. Cairo read the docking notice in the newspaper about La Paloma. He surmised that the Captain would be delivering the falcon to Brigid when the ship from Hong Kong arrived. Cairo had also remembered that he heard in Hong Kong that Brigid and Jacobi were seen together.
 * Spade was "slipped a mickey" in Mr. Gutman's words, to keep him out of the way, so Gutman and Cairo could surprise Jacobi and Brigid at the dock. Cairo, Gutman, and Wilmer found Captain Jacobi with Brigid on the ship. She agreed to give up the black bird for a price at Gutman's hotel, but she never arrived, as promised.
 * Wilmer had clumsily set the fire on the ship while he was searching for the "Maltese Falcon"
 * Cairo and Gutman caught up with Captain Jacobi and Brigid at her apartment, with Wilmer covering the fire escape. As the Captain (carrying the falcon) attempted to elude them in flight down the fire escape, Wilmer shot him, but somehow, the sea captain still made his escape.
 * Under harsh questioning, Brigid was "persuaded" to tell them where she had told Jacobi to take the falcon - to Spade's office. She was further "persuaded" to try and lure Spade away from his office to Burlingame with a distressed phone call - before Captain Jacobi arrived. But the call was late in coming and the bird was already delivered into Spade's hands. The gang then reconvened in Spade's apartment to await his arrival, while Brigid hid in the shadows outside.

The Maltese Falcon
The next morning, Effie delivers the Falcon and it is placed on a table in front of the conspirators. The bundle is feverishly unwrapped by Gutman. Gutman stands the statue up, turns it slowly, and strokes and caresses it with lascivious lust. The others salivate at the sight of the valuable, ebony statuette. To make sure it was genuine, he repeatedly and frantically scrapes and hacks at the leaden bird with his penknife, marking it and peeling back layers, realizing that its surface can be scarred and that the coated bird doesn't contain jewels.

Arrest and Defeat
Spade blames Brigid for the false statue, but she denies substituting the bird, insisting that it is the bird she got from the Russian general Kemidov. Cairo rages at Mr. Gutman and calls him an idiot and a fool for not seeing the falcon was fake. He collapses into a chair mopping and blabbering. Recomposing himself and accepting another failed attempt, Gutman vows to continue his pursuit of the real bird that is still in Russian hands. The trio leaves the room to continue the search but Spade immediately calls the cops on the gang, and the police catch up to them and arrest the trio offscreen.