The Long Goodbye Movie
Storyline
TAGLINES
Nothing says goodbye like a bullet.
"I have two friends in the world. One is a cat. The other is a murderer." - Elliot Gould as Phillip Marlowe
Chain-smoking, wisecracking private eye Philip Marlowe drives a buddy from LA to the Tijuana border and returns home to an apartment full of cops who arrest him for abetting the murder of his friend's wife. After Marlowe's release, following the reported suicide in Mexico of his friend, a beautiful woman hires him to locate her alcoholic and mercurial husband. Then, a hoodlum and his muscle visit to tell Marlowe that he owes $350,000, mob money the dead friend took to Mexico. Marlowe tails the hood, who goes to the house of the woman with the temperamental husband. As Marlowe pulls these threads together, his values emerge from beneath the cavalier wisecracking.
| Elliott Gould | Philip Marlowe |
| Nina Van Pallandt | Eileen Wade |
| Sterling Hayden | Roger Wade aka Billy Joe Smith |
| Mark Rydell | Marty Augustine |
| Henry Gibson | Dr. Verringer |
| David Arkin | Harry |
| Jim Bouton | Terry Lennox |
| Warren Berlinger | Morgan |
| Jo Ann Brody | Jo Ann Eggenweiler |
| Stephen Coit | Det. Farmer |
| Jack Knight | Mabel |
| Pepe Callahan | Pepe |
| Vincent Palmieri | Vince |
| Pancho Córdova | Doctor |
| Enrique Lucero | Jefe |
| Robert Altman |
7.60 out of 10 (4713 votes)
Visitor Reviews
One of Altman's most enjoyable films
posted on 01 Aug 2009I 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.
Buy it for film library!
posted on 11 Jul 2009 You really need to own this film. It's truly a solid film in so many different ways. Robert Altman is a superb director. Elliot Gould plays a truly excellent detective who was betrayed by a 'friend' who has ruthlessly murdered a woman. He can't believe that the man he knew was capable of this crime. How did he become the hood that works for Marty Augustine? In the final scene he is chided by the Terry, "Who cares!" Marlowe remarks, "I care", and kills him with a bullet. Was it his disgust with him? Or a sense of betrayal?
Mrs. Wade draws the wrong conclusions about Marlowe after he sits in jail for three days. Early in the film Marlowe tells Mrs. Wade that he doesn't do divorce work but her husband departed before she could separate or divorce from him. So she hires Marlowe to find him and bring him home. When Roger Wade returns home with Marlowe he must be wondering is there a chance to save the marriage? It's those first minutes with his wife that tell him nothing has changed. Like Terry Lennox, Roger Wade has changed. He's no longer the man that his wife married and wants.
He complains to Mrs. Lennox who is determined to put a stop to matters and killed by her own husband when she threatens to go to the police. At the police station Lt. Farmer asked Marlowe how come he knows so little about his friends? He places his trust in them but loyalty carries a price. Was it merely co-incidence? Marlowe receives five thousand bills from Marty Augustine and Terry Lennox for 'his troubles'. Didn't it simply confirm the doubts that had been growing in his mind about a good friend and the crime that he had committed?
Not for Marlowe fans or kids. They'll be disappointed.
An idiosyncratic Marlowe
posted on 14 May 2009I avoided this film for years after an encounter with a heavily edited version on broadcast television. I just revisited the film, and although I enjoyed it much more than I expected, I still have mixed feelings about it.There is much to like about Altman's idiosyncratic take on Raymond Chandler's "L.A. noir." The film is exquisitely cast; although Elliot Gould's laconic, mumbling Marlowe is not to my taste (I prefer my Marlowe more focused and intense), his fearlessness and moral rectitude are completely convincing. Transposing the novel into the 1970s, a notion which I initially recoiled from, actually works well because it enhances the contrast between the integrity of Marlowe and the shallowness and degradation of the world he inhabits. Leigh Brackett's shocking final scene also strikes me as an improvement on Chandler's more muted conclusion; Marlowe's reaction to the betrayal of his value system seems perfectly appropriate.However, Altman fills the film with stylistic quirks that are simply too distracting. The camera moves constantly and arbitrarily (Altman offers a weak rationale for this in an interview on the DVD, saying something about voyeurism, but he also acknowledges that much of the movement is for no reason). Having the theme music turn up everywhere Marlowe goes also serves no purpose; it's simply a conceit that Altman found amusing. Marlowe's mint-condition vintage car is a far too heavy-handed reminder of the Marlowe-as-anachronism theme. And how does this perpetually underemployed gumshoe afford a penthouse apartment?The intricate plot of Chandler's novel is deemphasized and submerged here; the story here is simply a thread connecting a series of stylized and improvisation-heavy scenes. Devoted Chandler fans should check this out, but it's definitely more of an Altman film than a Chandler film.
$50 Per Day Plus Expenses
posted on 30 Apr 2009A youthful Elliot Gould at the top of his form makes for an easy-going yet no nonsense Phillip Marlowe in this contemporized (1973) adaptation of Raymond Chandler's novel of the same name. Directed by Robert Altman from Leigh Brackett's screenplay, Gould's Marlowe is an irreverent and "laid-back-until-pushed-too-hard" private detective who goes to the aid of a friend only to become immersed in a mystery of deceit, drug money and double murder. Gould's chain-smoking and cat-loving Marlowe is surrounded with typical 70s-circa Hollywood/Malibu characters including uninhibited hippie-chick neighbors, an assortment of thugs both criminal and badged, a controlling sanitarium administrator, and an alcohol-abusive novelist played by 50s star Sterling Hayden (Asphalt Jungle, Dr.Strangelove). A very cool John Williams/Johnny Mercer musical score helps establish and sustain the film's mood which ends with a scene that's both controversial as well as provocative. - DM
An Unlikely Success
posted on 27 Mar 2009I probably can't think of two genres less suited to each other than Altman's laid-back auteur era verite, and Chandler's highly stylized noir narratives. As such, I was pleasantly surprised by A Long Goodbye, which successfully updated the genre without attempting to imitate it. If wise-cracking Humphrey Bogart in black and white was the Philipe Marlow of 1940's Hollywood, there is a strange logic in a rumpled, mumbling, chain-smoking Elliot Gould taking on the mantle in 1973. Wheres in the 30's and 40's Los Angeles was all about stark shadows and mysterious damsels made up in Max Factor's finest, the 70's aesthetic was embodied by sunshine, femmes au natural, and the general chaos of an era and city that was still holding onto the past, and at the same time moving fast into the uncertain future. Although I was initially dubious about it, I'm so glad that Altman didn't do a period piece with this story. By translating the characters and sceneries to the present time, he has indelibly shown that Raymond Chadler's vision of Los Angeles transcends era or epoch. In fact, it may just be THE definitive portrayal of the City of Angels.
I wanna be semetic.
posted on 04 Mar 2009Altman films really do tend to be subjective beasts,but there has to be no denying that this film has one of the greatest openings in all of 1970's American cinema.Altman's most nihilistic film to date, and perhaps justifiably so if you stop to consider that Altman's vision of a morally bankrupt and shallow California is now well on it's way to being validated by a certain Austrian meathead, who way back in 1973 presumably had neither the foresight nor the mental fortitude to grasp the sheer irony of the situation as his even then dopey Aryan persona was deftly being blasted off the screen by the then righteous Elliot Gould's impenetrable Jewish cool.I want to see a sequel.
Robert Altman's inspired and ingenious modern revisionist take on legendary private detective Philip Marlowe
posted on 10 Feb 2009Elliott Gould delivers a brilliantly loosey-goosey performance as a shabby, rundown, laid-back and sarcastic Philip Marlowe, who finds himself adrift and out of place in mean'n'selfish 70's Los Angeles. Marlowe investigates the apparent suicide of good buddy Terry Lennox (well essayed by former baseball player Jim Bouton). During his investigation Marlowe encounters boozy, washed-up writer Roger Wade (a beautifully touching performance by Sterling Hayden), Wade's alluring femme fatale wife Eileen (a solid portrayal by the stunningly gorgeous Nina Van Pallandt), sinister alcohol rehab clinic head Dr. Verringer (a splendidly slimy Henry Gibson), and volatile neurotic Jewish gangster Marty Augustine (a genuinely frightening turn by director Mark Rydell). Director Robert Altman, working from a wonderfully acid and ironic script by Leigh Brackett, deftly creates a morally topsy-turvy world where greed, betrayal and deception take precedent over honesty, loyalty and having a code of honor. Moreover, Altman peppers the film with a lot of nice and amusing quirky touches: numerous variations of the haunting main theme occur throughout the picture (there's even an insipid Muzak version on the PA system at an all-night supermarket!), a security guard does dead-on celebrity impressions, Marlowe keeps on nonchalantly saying "That's okay with me" at regular intervals, and Augustine breaks a Coke bottle over his lovely girlfriend's face. Vilmos Vsigmond's bright, gleaming, smoothly gliding and agile cinematography gives the film an exquisitely lustrous slick look. The lush, jazzy orchestral score by John Williams likewise totally hits the spot. Popping up in nifty bit parts are David Carradine as a spacey philosophical flake in a jail cell and Arnold Schwarzenegger as one of Augustine's goons. A real treat.
Return of the Shaggy Dog
posted on 29 Jan 2009The way a film starts can tell you a lot about where it's going. When Marlowe stumbles out of bed, mumbling and beholden to a mewing feline, you know you will not witness a typical translation of Chandler's work. I had reservations before seeing this movie the first time, worried, as I was, that Altman, by taking liberties with the novel upon which its based, was somehow mocking the source material. I was wrong. The Long Goodbye isn't a loyal translation of the novel, in terms of narrative, but it maintains the spirit, at least, and updates it for a new era. It's as cynical as Chandler's novel, but it's a different (and, perhaps, more justified) cynicism. If anything, Altman chose not to mock the source so much as to mock the continuing glut of crime films that refused to update their heroes for a post-Kennedy, post-King, Vietnam world. What happens when you take a retro gumshoe and drop them into the southern California of the early 1970s? They seem distinctly out of place. They don't seem to get it and, as a result, they find themselves in a lot of trouble. Marlowe, in this version of the Long Goodbye, spends much of his time as a fish out of water. He's fairly ineffective as a private detective, though he does achieve a certain amount of success finding Roger Wade and deducing what truly happened with Terry Lennox. He's stumbling in the dark for enough of the film, though, to make his successes seem the product of chance, not skill. Some may call this the inversion of the genre--I would say, however, that Altman takes a familiar genre and all its trappings but places it anachronistically in the then-present to show the failure of the genre's tropes to universally translate. Without the Long Goodbye, would there have been a Chinatown? A Farewell My Lovely? Perhaps, but Altman's masterful rendition certainly paved the way for those arguably more successful pictures. In addition to upsetting a genre, though, the Long Goodbye contains an amazing performance by Elliot Gould, who more or less carries the film by himself (no one else has enough screen time), as well as a marvelous turn by Sterling Hayden, who seems to channel Ernest Hemmingway and Raymond Chandler simultaneously. The other supporting roles are filled with equally effective performances. There is also the sun- drenched photography. The Long Goodbye might be a noir, but it's not particularly dark, in terms of its colors. Much of the action takes place in the daylight, which, I think, makes it all the more ominous. All in all, this is a fantastic film and one of Altman's best.
I Don't Know Why You Say Goodbye, I Say Hello
posted on 02 Jan 2009This shambling, rambling, occasionally brilliant film noir update places Chandler's rumpled shamus Philip Marlowe in the drugged-up swirl of 1970's Hollywood. Elliott Gould does some of his best work here, be-bopping and shuffling to his own ragged moral rhythms, rolling off Marlowe's internal soliloquies as a perpetually half-stoned mumble. The missing-person "plot" is even less essential here than it was in "The Big Lebowski", but Altman and Gould (as well as Sterling Hayden, raging into a paper bag as a washed-up writer) provide a perfectly ragged atmosphere.
if you don't like this movie (or just kinda like it), then you don't get it!!!
posted on 18 Nov 2008this is one of those movies, either you get it or you don't. to watch it one time isn't enough. this movie takes a great many number of times to really get the jist of what is going on. not only that but the direction is so intense and spontaneous that certain shots will fly by without you noticing them, or care to notice them. every shot in the movie means something, whether it be a closeup on some trophy ducks on a famous writer's wall, a maid sweeping outside of a beach house, or a certain nod of the head Sterling Hayden's character gives to his wife. Hayden is my favorite character. there is one scene where he and Elliot Gould are talking, having a drink together on Hayden's patio facing the beach. i can't go into describing this scene without you having viewed the movie a couple of times. there is something so amazing between the discourse, esp. when Hayden refers to Gould as a "Ding-a-ling", adding: "You don't always mean what you say." and this is how Gould's character survives thru the movie, sort of roaming, floating his way from lead to lead. in my reviews i write them as if the person reading has seen the movie, i write fiction, not reviews, so i will not mention any plot 'cept that Gould is basically trying to prove that his buddy, who is blamed for killing his wife and stealing from a local mobster, is innocent. that's an important part of the movie, that Gould assumes from the beginning that everyone is guilty except for his friend. we only see his friend in the beginning of the movie... well, that's all i'll say about that. but you can see from the acting in the one scene that they are both very close. and, well, Gould is pretty doomed from the start since he has such a set opinion on what the outcome of the case will be - that is friend is innocent, or rather, that he isn't guilty. there are some great performances, of course by Gould - this is the best role for him ever, even better than M*A*S*H, also Henry Gibson is great, the main girl, a beautiful blonde - can't get her name in my head right now - is very mysterious but subtly so, Mark Rydell as the gangster is surprisingly effective (he's short and kinda wimpish looking but oh man does he deliver one of the most brutal hood scenes ever), and keep your eye out for two cameos, one from David Carradine who plays a rambling drunk in Gould's jail cell, and (gov.) Arnold the Terminator (i cant spell that last name for the life of me) as one of Rydell's hoods. this is a great movie and i watch it twice a week sometimes, and is my favorite movie of all time, is directed incredibly, should be in the top 100 of all time, and each time you'll see something new. there is a whole lot within this picture, and anyone who just sees the outside of it, like Gould's character does - as he should, he's a gumshoe - than it's time to watch it again; and again and again...
Inspired Orchestration of Talent
posted on 26 Oct 2008Robert Altman at top form here delivers a revolutionary and breakthrough film that is still under-appreciated, perhaps because it is too easily tagged as updated film noir. Say what you want about the Marlowe character and the Chandler novels -- it was all top flight pulp fiction, that's all, no matter how it fascinated the French and who started calling it noir.
The plot has been done 100,000 times -- cheap detective and unsolved crime, beautiful woman as alluring foil, and a host of red herrings, weirdos, suspects, crazies, all keeping you on edge until last cut. And sure, Bogart nailed this particular character memorably in the author's own time, in a manner which could only have been done then. But neither the text nor character are sancrosanct. They were good available fodder to launch something more.
That something more is an extraordinary actuality, a gritty realism that captures BOTH southern California and the 1970s -- a time and a place -- as nothing else on record. Watching the movie is uncanny, like entering a dream or a time warp. It reminds you of the possibilities of cinema that still, with the art form not yet a century old, remain to be explored. The wayward Gould is perfect, and he is perfectly used. The great and under-rated Sterling Hayden delivers a vastly haunting performance, as a man from a whole other American time and place -- just as real as the one on camera but already gone -- leaving him a quite menacing fish out of water. The music -- a lovely but endlessly repeated strain, finally becomes as stultifyingly hypnotizing as a mantra from the far east. That plus a surrealistic camera drench you in the great big NOW -- yet combine to give the movie the patina of timelessness. All the characters are caught in this gauzy vision as if in amber, specimens ever freshly packaged and delivered to us in all the weirdness and eccentricity of their time and place. And finally, the master's touch -- using two non-actors for the key noir roles -- "disgraced" (just disgracefully honest, really) baseball pitcher turned author Jim Bouten as the baddie, and the mistress of then headlines maker Clifford Irving (forger of the notorious fake Howard Hughes autobiography) as the femme fatale. It is as if Altman lifts these two, in the cucoons of their media noteriety of the day, and finds matching fictive wrappings to transport their enigmas fully intact to us and the unknown future. That effect is incredible enough, but the undertow is how it ups the ante for what the seemingly hapless Gould character must do -- in his own way ripped out of time and place and thrown helpless into a strange and terrifying world. You certainly wouldn't figure he would prevail.
Altman's unique gift is to orchestrate the talent, set all the balls in motion, then get out of the way, let others run downfield with his inspirations. Far from being the sort of controlling director as Kubrick or Orson Welles, or for that matter Kurosawa or Bergman, Altman is true successor to the mantle of Nicholas Ray, maker of Rebel Without a Cause. His enterprise exudes a democratic American confidence, but not shouting at you, either. This film ranks as twin peak to his Nashville, his other best work. All that, and the film is also funny as hell. And finally more grimly serious than any classic noir, as all moves to convulsive and unexpected conclusion. The difference from ordinary noir is that this take on the genre is not stylized. It takes the plum out of the pulp fiction, so to speak, treats that little germ of truth in Raymond Chandler's noir world as seriously as any big truth in serious literature, something to be fully explored, developed, reckoned with. When Marlowe walks away at the end he's no longer Marlowe, he's somebody you never met and hope you never do, a terrifying moment of revelation.
A poor translation of an interesting book
posted on 08 Sep 2008There's no doubt that Raymond Chandler is a wonderful writer. But this film version of The Long Goodbye does not do the book any justice. It throws out the 1930's historical context and sets the book in the 1960's. This does not work. Elliot Gould is totally miscast as Philip Marlowe, Chandler's famous private eye. Gould lacks the toughness and wit of Chandler's Marlowe as well as the mannerisms and philosophy. Not surprising, The Long Goodbye is a complete flop. Don't waste your time and money on this film even if you love Chandler, Marlowe and film noir. Thomas Lee.
Altman's update of the Chandler novel
posted on 18 Jun 2008This film came out a few years before private detective stories became popular again with "Chinatown" but many feel that this often overlooked gem is as good if not better than those. Story is from the Raymond Chandler novel but takes place in Los Angeles in 1973 where we see an updated version of Philip Marlowe (Elliott Gould) who encounters his friend Terry Lennox (Jim Bouton) who asks him for a ride to the Mexico border. He helps his friend but later both the police and gangsters start to harass him over the accusation that Terry has killed his wife. Marlowe is held by the police for three days and gets his picture in the paper which leads to a job opportunity in Malibu. Eileen Wade (Nina Van Pallandt) hires him to find her writer husband Roger (Sterling Hayden) which he does by locating him at a sleazy rest home.*****SPOILER ALERT*****Marlowe also gets a visit from a local gangster named Marty Augustine (Mark Rydell) who tells him that Terry took off with his money and that he had better find it. He learns that Terry committed suicide in Mexico after killing his wife but Marlowe doesn't believe it and after asking some questions discovers that there is a connection between the Wade's and the Lennoxes and Marty. The trail Marlowe follows leads him back to Mexico where he finds out the truth (More or less) and a conclusion that differs from the novel.This film is directed by Robert Altman who adds just the right touch for updating an old Raymond Chandler story and Altman always has been great in filming stories in LA. Once again he shows LA in such a way that we can all relate to it like the lesbian yoga girls next door and the security guard who does impressions of movie stars. From the beach homes in Malibu to the chic apartments in the hills this is a Los Angeles that seemingly only Altman can capture with such glory and it's shot by the great cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond. Gould's interpretation of Marlowe is different in that he's more of a mumbler and a person totally out of sync with the way that the world is changing. He's not a tough guy and he chain smokes constantly and wears the same dark suit everyday even when sitting in the sun on the beach. At the same time Gould is perfect in the lead and his laid back coolness is used perfectly and in interviews he would state that this role helped rejuvenate his sagging career. There are other good performances in this film as well and Van Pallandt is exceptionally well cast but Hayden as the broken down alcoholic writer is memorable. This script is written by Leigh Brackett who was the co-writer for the 1946 film "The Big Sleep" and he along with Altman recapture a genre of film that most thought was long dead. In small roles you can see David Carradine in a jail cell and you can't miss Arnold Schwarzenegger as one of Marty's henchman. Many think that this is equally as great as "Nashville" and "McCabe & Mrs. Miller" but I feel that this is a small notch below those wonderful films but at the same time this is a terrific film that is easily one of Altman's best.
It's Okay With Me.......
posted on 26 May 2008Robert Altman takes the detective genre and turns it inside out with a real cynical 70's take and a lot of good humor. Instead of the crisp, crackling Maltese Falcon, Big Sleep, Lady in the Lake dialogue & snappy pace, we get a laid-back, slouching, rumpled Elliot Gould as Marlowe, a private detective in the modern world, with no glamor and no cachet. No dames are falling over this guy. He isn't pals with the cops. He isn't a dark knight patrolling the mean city streets. He's a informal slob doing schlock work in a world that doesn't give a damn.
Or is he? Marlowe is smarter than anyone gives him credit, and in the end, he does seem to give a damn about an ultimate justice.
Along the way he meets a maniacal, funny, and frightening Mark Rydell as Marty Augustine, the gangster. Jim Boughton, an erstwhile friend and typical Malibu hanger-on hustler. An indelible Sterling Hayden as an alcoholic writer very close to the man he really was at the end (an alcoholic novelist). Nina Van Pallandt the femme fatale. And assorted characters & creeps, topless neighbors & sinister shrinks all done in the controlled improvisational style of the best of Altman. Take note too, that the camera is constantly in motion in nearly every shot.
There is some nice dialogue, an unforgettale scene when Rydell gives his mistress a Coke (!), and a sweetly sardonic updated ending that fits the modern world better than Chandler's did. I really give it 4-1/2, knocking off the 1/2 star because the repeating of the song everywhere throughout the movie was just too cute. Really worth seeing.
Minus 100
posted on 26 May 2008Sorry, this movie just didn't work. Tried to watch it twice, and just couldn't get through the whole thing. Was it supposed to be a thriller? A murder mystery? A comedy? A drama? What?
Don't waste your time. If there are any other Philip Marlowe films out there, try them instead. Nothing could be as bad and weak as this film. The only thing I liked about it was the cat (which I am not sure was ever fed!!).
Only Altman Could Have Made This Movie
posted on 17 May 2008"The Long Goodbye" is director Robert Altman's take on the hardboiled crime fiction of Raymond Chandler and his most accomplished screenwriter, Leigh Brackett. It was an odd film when first released, the conceit being Philip Marlowe's taking a big sleep in the 1940s, only to awaken in Southern California in the 1970s. It's now an even odder film, since the 70s are long gone and make for a certain kind of period picture. But if you're willing to be carried along by Altman and his merry band of players, led by Elliott Gould, you'll probably enjoy the ride.
The Long Goodbye - Redux
posted on 10 May 2008First of all lets get this out of the way. Who cares if its not the same as the book? I just recently re-read the book after just re-viewing the movie several weeks again. They're different - so what,end of story. Thebook is filled with wonderful language and interesting dialogue. The movie is filled with wonderful images and great images. I think it is certainly Gould's best work and one of Altman's best movies.. after Nashville. The music is great.. in fact I've been singing the theme song for the last two months and it is beginning to get tiresome. But that's another matter.Altman and the script have pulled Marlowe kicking and screaming into the eighties but just because Marlowe has pulled his ethics with him does not mean he hasn't learned to adapt. Those people who have commented that Marlowe hasn't adapted are no better or worse than Lennox who derisively calls Marlowe a loser. I think that is where people are missing the point. I don't think of Marlowe as a loser. I look at him much as Chandler did. Of course the Chandler Marlowe would never have killed Lennox. Alman's Chandler does. Even he, Marlowe, can only be pushed so far.Hurrah for Hollywood.
Spot on Gould
posted on 30 Aug 2009Gould was top notch in this update of Raymond Chandler's Long Goodbye. He was perfect as a casual wise a** trying to find out what exactly happened to his friends. The movie, while it has some seemingly random plotlines ties up nicely in the end. Personally, I think that this is Altman's best film next to MASH.