Saw this movie when it was released, and was delighted: It was good to see Marlowe back in period L.A., dressed properly and surrounded by the right cars after the noble (but failed) experiment two years before of the Altman/Gould "The Long Goodbye".
For me, though, it hasn't worn well; and I am particularly mystified by all the claims here that this version is somehow more "authentic" than the vastly more entertaining (it was Chandler's favorite Marlowe film) "Murder, My Sweet". When you have eliminated the Anne Riordan love- interest character in favor of a newsboy; combined quietly deadly psychic Jules Amthor with Dr. Sonderborg into a loud, crude, butch-gay whorehouse madam and set Marlowe's captivity in her joint instead of a private hospital, added an entire subplot surrounding a trumpet player and his family, and deleted Detective Randall, well ... I fail to see how that is any more "true-to-Chandler" than the changes in the Dick Powell version.
The film looks great, the music and period details are right, but there really isn't any "there" there: Mitchum's too old (although he always has and always will look better in a trench-coat than anyone in history), Charlotte Rampling's too willowy and silver-spoonish to have EVER been the Velma Valento of the novel; in general all the parts were better cast and acted in "Murder, My Sweet", and there is a leaden feel to a great deal of the film that Chandler certainlt didn't put there.
Only John Ireland's portrayal of cop-on-the-fence Nulty really grabbed me when I revisited my VHS copy last week -- it's not the Nulty of the book (more authenticity?), but Ireland is fully engaged from start to finish while Mitchum often dozes and Rampling simpers and pouts.
Do yourself a favor: First read "Farewell, My Lovely" (still a hard-boiled treat), then watch the Dick Powell and Robert Mitchum versions in any order you choose. (Extra Credit: get hold of James Garner's "Marlowe", a re- telling of Chandler's "The Little Sister" and add that to the mix ... )
I think you just might find that Powell & Company are truer to the actual rhythm and tone of a novel which dances (yes, that's the right word) edgily from light-footed hilarity to angst and back again with side trips into quick, tart social commentary; good as Mitchum occasionally is in this one, he (along with Bogart in "The Big Sleep") just ain't the often-puzzled-but-always-game dancer that was and is Philip Marlowe.
This version of "Farewell My Lovely" is selling nostalgia, not Chandler.
For me, though, it hasn't worn well; and I am particularly mystified by all the claims here that this version is somehow more "authentic" than the vastly more entertaining (it was Chandler's favorite Marlowe film) "Murder, My Sweet". When you have eliminated the Anne Riordan love- interest character in favor of a newsboy; combined quietly deadly psychic Jules Amthor with Dr. Sonderborg into a loud, crude, butch-gay whorehouse madam and set Marlowe's captivity in her joint instead of a private hospital, added an entire subplot surrounding a trumpet player and his family, and deleted Detective Randall, well ... I fail to see how that is any more "true-to-Chandler" than the changes in the Dick Powell version.
The film looks great, the music and period details are right, but there really isn't any "there" there: Mitchum's too old (although he always has and always will look better in a trench-coat than anyone in history), Charlotte Rampling's too willowy and silver-spoonish to have EVER been the Velma Valento of the novel; in general all the parts were better cast and acted in "Murder, My Sweet", and there is a leaden feel to a great deal of the film that Chandler certainlt didn't put there.
Only John Ireland's portrayal of cop-on-the-fence Nulty really grabbed me when I revisited my VHS copy last week -- it's not the Nulty of the book (more authenticity?), but Ireland is fully engaged from start to finish while Mitchum often dozes and Rampling simpers and pouts.
Do yourself a favor: First read "Farewell, My Lovely" (still a hard-boiled treat), then watch the Dick Powell and Robert Mitchum versions in any order you choose. (Extra Credit: get hold of James Garner's "Marlowe", a re- telling of Chandler's "The Little Sister" and add that to the mix ... )
I think you just might find that Powell & Company are truer to the actual rhythm and tone of a novel which dances (yes, that's the right word) edgily from light-footed hilarity to angst and back again with side trips into quick, tart social commentary; good as Mitchum occasionally is in this one, he (along with Bogart in "The Big Sleep") just ain't the often-puzzled-but-always-game dancer that was and is Philip Marlowe.
This version of "Farewell My Lovely" is selling nostalgia, not Chandler.