Directed by Dick Richards
Written by David Zelag Goodman from the novel by Raymond Chandler
1975/US
IMDb page
First viewing/Amazon Prime rental
Philip Marlowe: [opening lines] This past spring was the first that I felt tired and realized I was growing old. Maybe it was the rotten weather we’d had in L.A. Maybe the rotten cases I’d had. Mostly chasing a few missing husbands and then chasing their wives once I found them, in order to get paid. Or maybe it was just the plain fact that I am tired and growing old.
Robert Mitchum brings a world-weary persona and some gravitas to Chandler’s gumshoe Philip Marlowe.
The story is set in the days preceding the U.S. entry into WWII. Philip Marlowe (Mitchum) is an aging, struggling private eye in Los Angeles. One day, he is visited by Moose Malloy who more or less commands Marlowe to locate his girl Velma, for a fee of course. Moose has just been released from several years in prison and is eager to reunite with Velma whom he merely describes as “as cute as lace pants”. Marlowe and Moose visit the nightclub where she used to work. She’s not there and the club’s ownership and clientele is now African-American. The volatile Moose ends up killing a man, the first of many killings in this convoluted plot. Marlowe doesn’t even have a photograph to go on.
Marlowe always appears to be at or near the scene of the crime and he has Detective Nutley (John Ireland) and Billy Rolfe (Harry Dean Stanton) oh his case at all times. Meanwhile, a variety of people who don’t want Velma to be located use the double-cross and other means to get near Marlowe and do away with his snooping.
The closer Marlowe gets to Velma (Charlotte Rampling), the more deadly the game becomes. With Sylvia Miles as a drunken informant and Sylvester Stallone as a thug.
Robert Mitchum makes a fine Philip Marlowe. The tone of this movie is quite a bit darker and more violent than the original Murder, My Sweet (1944). Charlotte Rampling puts the fatal into femme fatale. We see LA strictly from its seedy underbelly and Marlowe is one of the few decent characters in the film. Richards does well in translating film noir for the 70’s. I don’t know that the original film needed a re-make but this does make for some engrossing viewing.
Sylvia Miles was nominated for the Best Supporting Actress Oscar.
Mitchum is the whole show here. A very low budget and seedy take on the Chandler novel. I just wish Mitchum made some of these films during the 1950’s. Interestingly John A. Alonzo did the cinematography and was very different from the work he did on “Chinatown.” As great as Mitchum is, in my book the greatest Philip Marlowe film is and always will be, “The Big Sleep” 1946.
Maybe RKO didn’t own the rights to any of the books? Mitchum stuck with Howard Hughes through thick and thin because Hughes stuck with him after a marijuana arrest that could have been a career killer . I would pick Mitchum as the definitive protagonist of noir in a very tight race for that prize.
Neo-noirs have an atmosphere of their own, not quite the same as the classic 40s noirs but interesting in its own way. What makes FAREWELL, MY LOVELY so great is that it has that neo-noir feel but at the same time it goes the closest to capturing the classic noir atmosphere as well.
And Mitchum’s performance as an ageing Marlowe is wonderful. This is exactly how you’d imagine Marlowe ageing.
Charlotte Rampling is superb. It’s one of her two great performances. The other being, of course, THE NIGHT PORTER.
You know, I was really looking forward to The Night Porter – mostly because of my long standing love affair with Dirk Bogarde. But, alas, for some reason it was not to be. Agree with all your points. One of the things that made the classic noirs so mesmerizing was that wonderful high contrast B&W cinematography. I love it so. It’s really hard to create the same atmosphere in color.
I agree. The visual style was a crucial part of what made film noir a distinctive genre. Film noir was all about shadows – not just as visual style but as an essential symbolic component. Without the shadows a film noir can’t be a real film noir.
I see neo-noir as being essentially a different genre. Certainly related to classic noir, but really a distinctive genre of its own. If you look at great neo-noirs such as CHINATOWN and BODY HEAT I think it’s obvious that you’re dealing with a distinctive genre.
FAREWELL, MY LOVELY did the impossible – it created what felt like a classic noir visual style in colour.
Agree that they came up with a classic look for the early 40’s and also had the advantage of no Hayes Code. Looking forward to seeing the Mitchum “The Big Sleep” in a few “years”. Is it any good?
I haven’t seen the Mitchum version of THE BIG SLEEP yet. I’m told it’s disappointing compared to FAREWELL, MY LOVELY. But I will have to get around to seeing it.
I love Mitchum but the remake of “The Big Sleep” is embarrassing. Michael Winner was one of the worse directors since Ed Wood and far less amusing! Stick with Bogie, Becall and Howard Hawks.
Thanks for the warning! It’s certainly not a film that needed a remake.
Thanks for mentioning this one, it inspired me to finally watch it. I’ll have to go against the tide here, sets excellent but acting/writing fell short of a classic noir (was that partially by being in colour??…and I realise that’s not “acting”, just something was missing). Mitchum did “so sick of this life” perfectly.
Mitchum is really the reason to watch this one. I prefer my noirs in black-and-white though there are some good neo-noirs – all those Melville films, Body Heat, etc.
Have you seen The Friends of Eddie Coyle (1973)? I think Mitchum is at his “so sick” prime in that one.
THE FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE is a movie I’ve been meaning to see for years. But for some reason I still haven’t actually seen it.
There’s no time like the present!