The Long Goodbye
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Movie Reviews of The Long Goodbye
Movie Review: Subverting a Genre
Summary: 4 Stars
During a documentary extra on the DVD version of The Long Goodbye, director Robert Altman says they called Elliott Gould's version of Phillip Marlowe "Rip Van Marlowe" because it's like the iconic 1940's detective character fell asleep for 30 years and awoke in the 1970s.
True to form, the opening scene shows Marlowe being jolted out of a deep sleep. Gould plays Marlowe like he has stumbled out of hibernation and is completely baffled by everything going on around him. He does, however, take it with a 70's stoned indifference.
The film opens with interconnecting scenes between Phillip Marlowe and Terry Lennox (Jim Bouton). The soundtrack plays the same song through both scenes, but in completely different styles. Over Marlowe's scenes the music is soft and jazz like, while when Lennox is on screen it becomes more edgy, more rock influenced. It is a brilliant way to introduce characters and give us a sense of who they are.
This is not Howard Hawk's Raymond Chandler. Gone are the dark shadows, and production code of film noir. The sex and violence is no longer hidden under innuendo and suggestion. Here Marlowe's neighbors are drug ingesting nudists. This is Altman's subversion of a genre.
This is definitely a Robert Altman picture. There are plenty of trademark long shots, and overlapping dialogue. He is less interested in the Chandler story, than in a sense of style and the juxtaposition of classically moral 1930's detective in the amoral times of the swinging 1970s.
The story loosely follows Raymond Chandler's novel. Marlowe drives his friend, Lennox, to the Tijuana border only to return home to an apartment full of cops ready to arrest him for aiding and abetting Lennox, who is suspected of murdering his wife. Meanwhile Eileen Wade (Nina Van Pallandt) hires Marlowe to find her alcoholic husband who has disappeared. Between the cops and the missing husband Marlowe is accosted by local gangsters who want the money Lennox owes them. The three stories meet and interconnect in an ending that is vastly different from the novel.
There is a wonderful scene after the cops arrest Marlowe and are interrogating him. It begins as the standard interrogation scene with Marlowe in a small room being slapped around by tough cops, while others watch through a two way mirror. Altman invigorates the scene by inter-cutting the two rooms together. While the camera is in the interrogation room, the two way mirror is always in sight. When the scene moves into the outer room, we see through the mirror and can hear the Marlowe conversation as it overlaps with what the watching cops are saying.
Elliott Gould is brilliant as Phillip Marlowe. He seems completely amiss from his surroundings, oblivious to all the things going on all around him. He keeps the Chandler wisecracks going, but sends the tough guy gumshoe routine packing.
Though not a film for noir or even Chandler purists, it is a brilliant piece of cinema. In subverting a genre Altman has created a new kind of detective drama. One that is humorous, thrilling and cinematic.
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Movie Review: One of Altman's most enjoyable films
Summary: 4 Stars
I saw this film as part of the Cal State Northridge Cinematheque Critics Series with a special visit from Pulitzer-Prize winning critic Joseph Morgenstern of The Wall Street Journal. The evening was moderated by David Kipen of the San Francisco Chronicle, Morgenstern gave great insight into the industry while presenting one of his favorite films, Robert Altman's The Long Goodbye.
I enjoyed The Long Goodbye. I did not find it tedious at all, like a woman in the audience expressed, but can understand why someone might think it is. Although the film moved slowly, it remained interesting, partly because of its characters. It was a dark noir with an absorbing and complicated mystery and plenty of humor. I especially liked Mr. Gould's rendition of the popular noir detective.
Philip Marlowe has been played by the likes of Humphrey Bogart, Robert Mitchum, and James Garner, all tremendous actors, but Elliott Gould gives the private eye a sort of stoner quality that fits perfectly into the 70's era. The Philip Marlowe of the 70's talks to himself and smokes way too much. He gets involved in a couple of cases, which all neatly come together at the end.
There's the central mystery of Marlowe's friend Terry Lennox, who may or may not have killed his wife. Marlowe is duped into driving him to Tijuana and when Lennox commits suicide, Marlowe is determined to figure out the truth. When his picture ends up in the paper, he is hired by a socialite named Eileen Wade to find her missing husband. Marlowe also gets into trouble with a gangster, who thinks he helped Lennox steal money from him. In one of the best, and most suspenseful, scenes in the film, the gangster smashes a coke bottle in his girlfriend's face to let Marlowe know he means business. Despite the mess he finds himself in, "It's okay with me" remains Marlowe's phrase of choice.
The mystery makes sense eventually with perhaps a too off the wall ending. Was it in Marlowe's nature to do what he did? Maybe, but no matter how stressed, tired, and betrayed he felt, there could have been a better way to handle the situation. I felt a bit suckered by the ending; not the climax, but Marlowe's actions in the resolution. It was too neat and perhaps a bit too unbelievable. I know plenty of people who might argue against me, but I stand by my opinion.
The other thing I didn't like about the film was the irritating title theme popping up in the most unusual places. It was okay at first, and in fact, had a nice little beat, but it got rather annoying hearing it in almost every scene. Were there no other songs around in the world of 1970's Philip Marlowe? Since the song had different reincarnations throughout, I'd think not.
Movie Review: DON'T PASS ON THIS 4 Stars
As a confirmed Raymond Chandler addict, I highly recommend this film if you're interested in more than trite, superficial fiction or literal interpretations. Now a purist might not be so fond of this film, but if you want to see what sort of ... results from a literal interpretation of a Marlowe novel brought into present day, then go watch the Bob Mitchum starring version of The Big Sleep. Conversely, if you want to see a good interpretation, then go watch the Mitchum starring Farewell, My Lovely, which wasn't stupid enough to bring the character into present day but left the more or less "literal" incarnation of this famous detective in the past (30's/40's) where he belongs. Altman's version of The Long Goodbye shows what sort of impossibility it is to imagine a real Philip Marlowe in (then) present day by updating the character into a fairly aimless, lost soul with not much to do and no place to belong (just as Chandler's moral though not quite shining knight would be if he were transported to more modern times). Now, The Long Goodbye itself is dated, almost as far back in the past relative to today as Chandler's world was to the day of Goodbye's making. Much can be learned here about what form values take in the modern environment, becoming confused, selfish to a degree, and darn near psychopathic (witness the final scene of this film to find out what sort of nihilistic twist the story takes compared to the original book). Much of the original novel is here, however, mainly the weary, sentimental, sad tone and the theme of friendship among men, one not so "bad," the other not so "good". Eliot Gould puts out one of the great acting jobs of the 1970's in this film, in my honest opinion. And far from being populated by "weirdos," this version of Chandler's classic novel is populated by characters that, more or less, are accurate portrayls of the kind of people who inhabited the beach communities of southern CA in the 1970's. In fact, not only do these people STILL exist in this area, but they existed in Chandler's day, as anyone who has actually read his novels will attest If you want a fun double feature, watch this film with The Big Lebowski, an even more "modern" take on the Marlowe mystique, though without Marlowe himself. If you want an educational triple header, throw in the Bogart/Bacall/Hawks version of The Big Sleep (the ultimate of all ultimate Marlowe films). If you really wanna have fun and have the free time & stamina, throw in the (1974?) version of Farewell, My Lovely, in my opinion an underrated 70's gem. If you want something to REALLY pass on, ignore the ... Mel Gibson film Payback, which is only a ... of the Lee Marvin Classic, Point Blank.Movie Review: WILL THE REAL PHILLIP MARLOWE STAND UP?
Summary: 4 Stars
Phillip Marlowe, Raymond Chandler's classic noir hard-boiled private detective forever literarily associated with Los Angeles and its means streets is right at home here in his search, at the request of a friend, for the inevitable `missing woman' (`dame' for the non-politically correct types) who 'conveniently' turns up dead. There is plenty of sparse but functional dialogue, physical action and a couple of plot twists, particularly around the identity of the above-mentioned `dame' and the motives behind the involvement of various wealthy Californians.
Have no fear however the intrepid Marlowe will figure it out in the end and some kind of 'rough' justice will prevail. At this point in the Chandler Marlowe series our shamus has been around the block more than a few times but he still is punching away at the 'bad guys' and the absurdity of the modern world. How does this one compare with the other Marlowe volumes? Give me those background oil derricks churning out the wealth while looking for General Sternwood's Rusty Regan in Big Sleep or the run down stucco flats in some shady places in pursuit of Moose's Velma in Farewell, My Lovely any day. Nevertheless, as always with Chandler, you get high literature in a plebeian package.
There have been many cinematic Phillip Marlowes from Bogart and Powell to Elliot Gould in this Altman production. They reflect their director's take on the times and on the character of Marlowe himself. The world-weary but virtuous Marlowe of the 1940's has been replaced in this film by a decidedly out-of-tune Marlowe who could realistically be arrested for vagrancy any minute in the up-scale and upward striving Los Angeles of 'new' California. Fortunately Robert Altman can make it work without being too syrupy. In other less capable hands, and with an actor other than Elliot Gould who sets the standard for all modern Marlowes (except probably the chain-smoking) giving his all to the role, that is an iffy proposition. In any case the days of Chandler's, Cain's and Hammett's intrepid California characters are long gone. But, thankfully, at least not on film. This one will join that crowd.
Movie Review: Reinvention of Marlowe
Summary: 4 Stars
I really enjoyed the featurettes that came with the DVD, one with Altman and Elliott Gould, the other with cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmund who discusses technical points that added to my apreciation of the movie. It's one of the few movies from the hippie era that hasn't aged badly because the naked girls doing yoga on the balcony are as perplexing to Marlowe as they are to the viewer of today. The female star, Nina Van Pallandt, who plays Eileen Wade is genius casting. In fact the actor who plays Roger Wade, Eileen's husband, is also beautifully cast--Sterling Hayden. One wonders what the film would have been like if Dan "Hoss from Bonanza" Blocker had played the part of Roger Wade. In the featurette Altman reveals he nearly abandoned making the picture after Blocker's death, and he is listed in the credits in a weird sort of way. But back to Hayden and Van Pallandt. He is a man mountain with a big Lord of the Rings style beard, he could have played the Tree thing in Fellowship of the Ring. he has a long monologue on the beach with a bottle of frozen aquavit that's fantastic as anything he did for Coppola or Kubrick. And Nina Van Pallandt--who had been a kind of Danish folk singer and then one of the principals in the Howard Hughes/Clifford Irving forgery scandal of Ibiza--looks utterly gorgeous in the film, always wearing some ethnic hippie gown with sixty yards of material, always looking Scandinavian, with bogs of great sorrow in her dark eyes. She should have won the Oscar--that's plain to see nowadays. She's also great in Altman's A WEDDING as the drug-addled Mom.
And how many cigarettes does Elliott Gould smoke in this movie? It's as if he has discovered a new brand of acting which involves expressing oneself solely through cigarettes. No wonder Sterling Hayden calls him "Marlboro Man."
And the theme song is terrific, the lyrics, by Johnny Mercer, among Mercer's best. Between Johnny Mercer'sa contribution and those of Sterling Hayden and Leigh Brackett, Altman garnered the best of the 1940s and brought it into the 1970s for a last hurrah.