"It's OK with me...." Applying his deconstructive eye to the "film noir" tradition, Robert Altman updated Raymond Chandler in his 1973 version of Chandler's novel, The Long Goodbye. Smart-aleck, cat-loving private eye Philip Marlowe (Elliott Gould) is certain that his friend Terry Lennox (Jim Bouton) isn't a wife-killer, even after the cops throw Marlowe in jail for not cooperating with their investigation into Lennox's subsequent disappearance. Once he gets out of jail, Marlowe starts to
conduct his own search when he discovers that mysterious blonde Eileen Wade (Nina Van Pallandt), who hired him to find her alcoholic novelist husband Roger (Sterling Hayden), lives on the same Malibu street as the absent Lennox and his deceased spouse. As numerous variations on the title song play in unexpected places, Marlowe encounters a shady doctor (Henry Gibson), a bottle-wielding gangster (director Mark Rydell), and a guard aping Barbara Stanwyck (among other stars), before heading to Mexico to stumble onto the truth once and for all. ~ Lucia Bozzola, Rovi
Robert Altman's labyrinthine take on the Raymond Chandler classic is noir unburdened by a straight narrative - it's a triumph of atmosphere and attitude, a swiftly unfolding whodunit punctuated by subversive absurdities and shattering acts of violence.
Everywhere you look, there's something delightfully weird going on ... Altman and company fashion a state of slouching, freeform Zen that no one else has ever really duplicated.
When he was very near the top of his early peak, [Robert] Altman did the darnedest thing and made a private-eye movie -- or maybe a parody of a private-eye movie; it's hard to say. And he may never have topped it.
It ends up with mixed results -- Marlowe is drawn as a goofy daydreamer (Altman calls him Rip Van Marlowe) and his story only gets interesting when Sterling Hayden, channeling Hemingway, goes bananas.
Altman breaks apart the "noir" genre and Gould takes the character of Phillip Marlowe in a total different direction from the classic Hawks/Bogart version. This is one of my favorites.
I promise you have never seen a film quite like Robert Altman's 70s update of the iconic 40s gumshoe detective Phillip Marlowe. Altman crafts a dazzling, dizzying, kaleidoscopic adaptation of Raymond Chandler's novel. The film is a very decided departure from the norms of the film noir and Candler universe but it's
hard to deny the lasting impact the film has had. Many have tried to copy the almost magical level of style, mystery and cool attitude "The Long Goodbye" creates, but none have ever come close to repeating it. Elliott Gould makes for an indelible Marlowe and is backed by a great supporting cast in Nina Van Pallandt and Sterling Hayden and many others. "The Long Goodbye" is one of those genre changing crime films that sits comfortably next to "Breathless" and "Pulp Fiction." It's a unique experience.
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