The Big Sleep (1946)

Director:

Howard Hawks

Writers:

William Faulkner (screenplay) &
Leigh Brackett (screenplay) ...
(more)

Release Date:

31 August 1946 (USA)

Genre:

Crime | Film-Noir | Mystery | Thriller

Tagline:

The type of man she hated . . . was the type she wanted !

Plot:

Private detective Philip Marlowe is hired by a rich family. Before the complex case is over, he's seen murder, blackmail, and what might be love.

Plot Keywords:

Murder | General | Private Eye | Blackmail | Private Detective

Awards:

1 win

Cast

Humphrey Bogart	...	Philip Marlowe
Lauren Bacall	...	Vivian Rutledge
John Ridgely	...	Eddie Mars
Martha Vickers	...	Carmen Sternwood
Dorothy Malone	...	Acme Bookstore Proprietress
Peggy Knudsen	...	Mona Mars
Regis Toomey	...	Chief Inspector Bernie Ohls
Charles Waldron	...	General Sternwood
Charles D. Brown	...	Norris the Butler
Bob Steele	...	Lash Canino
Elisha Cook Jr.	...	Harry Jones
Louis Jean Heydt	...	Joe Brody
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Pat Clark	...	Mona Mars (scenes deleted)
James Flavin	...	Capt. Cronjager (scenes deleted)
Thomas E. Jackson	...	District Attorney White (scenes deleted)
Trevor Bardette	...	Art Huck (uncredited)
Joy Barlow	...	Taxi Driver (uncredited)
Max Barwyn	...	Max - Head Waiter (uncredited)
Deannie Best	...	Waitress (uncredited)
Tanis Chandler	...	Waitress (uncredited)
Jack Chefe	...	Croupier (uncredited)
Joseph Crehan	...	Medical Examiner (uncredited)
Sonia Darrin	...	Agnes Lowzier (uncredited)
Carole Douglas	...	Librarian (uncredited)
Jay Eaton	...	Man in Casino (uncredited)
Tom Fadden	...	Sidney (uncredited)
Bess Flowers	...	Woman with Bumped Man (uncredited)
Shep Houghton	...	Nightclub Patron (uncredited)
Pete Kooy	...	Motorcycle Cop (uncredited)
Lorraine Miller	...	Hatcheck Girl (uncredited)
Forbes Murray	...	Furtive Man (uncredited)
Shelby Payne	...	Cigarette Girl (uncredited)
Jack Perry	...	Silent Thug Beating Marlowe (uncredited)
Tommy Rafferty	...	Carol Lundgren (uncredited)
Emmett Vogan	...	Ed - Deputy Sheriff (uncredited)
Theodore von Eltz	...	Arthur Gwynn Geiger (uncredited)
Wally Walker	...	Mars' Thug (uncredited)
Dan Wallace	...	Owen Taylor (uncredited)
Paul Weber	...	Mars' Thug (uncredited)
Ben Welden	...	Pete (uncredited)

Directed by
Howard Hawks

Writing credits
William Faulkner		(screenplay) &
Leigh Brackett		(screenplay) &
Jules Furthman		(screenplay)
Raymond Chandler		(novel "The Big Sleep")

Produced by
Jack L. Warner	....	executive producer
Howard Hawks	....	producer (uncredited)

Original Music by
Max Steiner

Cinematography by
Sidney Hickox		(as Sid Hickox)

Film Editing by
Christian Nyby

Art Direction by
Carl Jules Weyl
Max Parker		(supervising art director) (uncredited)

Set Decoration by
Fred M. MacLean

Makeup Department
Perc Westmore	....	makeup artist

Production Management
Eric Stacey	....	production manager (uncredited)

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Chuck Hansen	....	assistant director (uncredited)
Robert Vreeland	....	assistant director (uncredited)

Sound Department
Robert B. Lee	....	sound
Gerald W. Alexander	....	sound effects mixer (uncredited)
Gerald W. Alexander	....	sound re-recording mixer (uncredited)
Robert G. Wayne	....	sound effects mixer (uncredited)
Robert G. Wayne	....	sound re-recording mixer (uncredited)

Special Effects by
Roy Davidson	....	special effects director (as E. Roy Davidson)
Warren Lynch	....	special effects (as Warren E. Lynch)
Robert Burks	....	special effects (uncredited)
William C. McGann	....	special effects (uncredited)
Willard Van Enger	....	special effects (uncredited)

Camera and Electrical Department
Michael P. Joyce	....	second camera operator (uncredited)

Costume and Wardrobe Department
Leah Rhodes	....	wardrobe

Music Department
Leo F. Forbstein	....	musical director
Simon Bucharoff	....	orchestrator (uncredited)
Charles David Forrest	....	music mixer (uncredited)

Production Companies

• Warner Bros. Pictures (as Warner Bros.-First National Pictures Inc.)

Distributors

• Warner Bros. Pictures (1946) (USA) (theatrical) (as Warner Bros. Pictures Inc.)
• Dominant Pictures Corporation (1956) (USA) (theatrical) (re-release)
• MGM/UA Home Entertainment (1997) (USA) (VHS)
• Warner Home Video (2000) (USA) (VHS)
• Chapel Distribution (1997) (Australia) (theatrical)
• Sociedade Importadora de Filmes (SIF) (????) (Portugal) (theatrical)
• United Artists (1996) (Germany) (theatrical) (re-release)
• Key Video (????) (USA) (VHS)
• Living Colour Entertainment (2009) (Netherlands) (DVD)
• Warner Home Video (2000) (USA) (DVD)
• Warner Home Video (2006) (USA) (DVD)

Runtime:

114 min | 116 min (pre-release version)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Certification:

Portugal:M/12 | New Zealand:PG | Sweden:(Banned) (original rating) | Argentina:16 | Australia:M | Australia:PG (alternate rating) | Canada:14A (video rating) | Chile:18 | Finland:(Banned) (1947-1949) | Finland:K-16 | Germany:16 | Norway:16 | Sweden:15 (re-rating) (1961) | UK:PG | USA:Approved (PCA #10625) | Iceland:12

Filming Locations:

Warner Brothers Burbank Studios - 4000 Warner Boulevard, Burbank, California, USA

Company:

Warner Bros. Pictures

Trivia:

While working on the script, writers William Faulkner and Leigh Brackett couldn't figure out from the novel who murdered a particular character. So they phoned Raymond Chandler, who angrily told them the answer was right there in the book. They shrugged and returned to their work. Chandler soon phoned to say that he looked at the book himself and couldn't figure out who killed the character, so he left it up to them to decide. In the original cut, shown to the armed services, this question is resolved; in the film as released, it isn't.

Goofs:

Continuity: The size of Vivian's glass and the amount of liquid in it doubles from when she walks to the bedroom window and sets the glass on the window sill.

Quotes:

Carmen Sternwood: You're cute. I like you.
Philip Marlowe: Yeah, what you sees nothing, I got a Balinese dancing girl tattooed across my chest.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Shadows of Suspense (2006) (V)

Soundtrack:

And Her Tears Flowed Like Wine

Classic Noir

Read all of my reviews at www.midnitcafe.blogspot.com This classic film noir has very few of techniques generally associated with noir. It contains no skewed camera angles; and though it is darkly lit, it is not overcome with murky, obscuring shadows. The hero is not down-and-out, poor, or desperate. There is no retrospective narration, or flashbacks. Yet, the Big Sleep is widely considered to be one of the very best of this genre. It is a cynical, perverse, murderous world filled with loads of confusing action and unknown motives. It is, in fact, one of the great films of one of the screens greatest actors (for my personal top 10 actors list, click here), and most talented directors.

It was directed by Howard Hawks fresh off of the successful pairing of Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Becall in To Have and Have Not. The two star here again and it is easy to see why they made another two films together. Based on a Raymond Chandler novel of the same name, many people complain that this film is incomprehensible. Somewhat famously it is reported that Bogart and Hawks, after arguing over who killed one of the characters, called up Chandler to get the correct answer. Chandler didn't have the slightest idea, for the novel is rather vague on this point. It's true that both the novel and film leave many plot points as to who did what to whom more than unclear, but there is so much style in both that it's hard to make a convincing argument against them.

A good deal of the confusion within the film comes from the production codes in effect at the time it was produced. Chandler's novel deals with murder, homosexuality, heterosexuality, and pornography. At the time, these things were deemed unfit to show on a movie screen and so Hawks had to hint at them using various subtle methods. For instance, when Carmen Sternwood (Martha Vickers) is found by detective Phillip Marlow (Bogart) in the novel she is completely nude and sitting posed for a hidden camera. Since pornography is explicitly against code, in the movie she is dressed in a silky, Japanese gown. There is still a hidden camera, and its missing film becomes a catalyst for much of the action in the film. We must infer from the exotic nature of the gown that there was more than just pictures of a woman in a gown going on. There are many similar instances in the film like this. For an audience member who has not read the book, they must pay close attention to the subtext, or the film will seem baffling.

Personally, I am very much a fan of the book, and all of Chandler's work. While I appreciate that some of the finer plot points are a bit vague in this film, I also understand that the film succeeds not in the details of the story, but in a sinister sense of style. The film oozes with a dark, disquieting atmosphere. Nearly everyone Marlowe meets is hiding something, and is of less than upstanding moral character. Hawks does a great job of keeping nearly every scene in the dark or in the rain, or both. There are so many characters coming in and out of the shadows and with their own shady character that it is difficult to keep up.

Bogart, of course, does a marvelous job as Marlowe. He seems to understand a lot more information than the audience is ever given. Chandler wrote Marlowe as a detective who sticks by his own set up morals, remaining somewhat of a noble creature trying to stay afloat amongst the muck and sewers of the city. Lauren Bacall does a very good job portraying Vivian Sternwood Rutledge, in a role that is much different than the one in the book. Like many films from this era, they create a romance that wasn't really in the source material. I don't mind though, because Bogart and Bacall really sizzle.

What can I say that hasn't been said before? This is really classic noir at its best. It's got Bogart and Bacall. It was directed by Howard Hawks, written by William Faulkner from a novel by Raymond Chandler. What more could a lover of classic cinema want? More reviews at www.midnitcafe.blogspot.com