Marlowe
Philip Marlowe, Los Angeles private investigator, acceptably handsome, though not so much as to stand out as the stars of Hollywood, laconic, a dry sense of humour used to extricate himself from sticky situations, though sometimes it has the effect of exacerbating them, an honest man when he can be, acting above board in his dealings a rarity in his profession, and he does not particularly enjoy the company of dead bodies, wisely stepping back if things are turning sour.
This is regrettably apparent in his latest case, hired by timid Orfamay Quest of Manhattan, Kansas, come west to find her missing brother Orrin, every lead Marlowe tracks leading him to another contact murdered by an ice pick to the back of the neck, the modus operandi of gangster Sonny Steelgrave, scene of the second crime also host to a frightened woman who flees, her licence plate identifying her as Mavis Wald, the star of the country’s top rated sitcom, Marlowe suddenly finding himself very popular with the wrong people.
A character established in Raymond Chandler’s 1939 novel The Big Sleep, it was on The Little Sister of 1949 that the film Marlowe was based, released in 1969 and directed by Paul Bogart from an adaptation by Stirling Silliphant, starring James Garner in the title role, already a television Western star from Maverick and soon to play another long-running private detective in The Rockford Files, the opening scenes at a hippie occupied hotel a concession to the changing times but the rest of the narrative faithfully carried over, even the names of the characters.
With Knight Rider‘s William Daniels as studio executive Crowell, cagey but recognising the need to protect his star, The Addams Family‘s Jackie Coogan as low-ranking mobster Grant Hicks and an early supporting role for Bruce Lee as a high-kicking enforcer, the requisite hot dames are The Legend of Hell House‘s serene Gayle Hunnicutt as Mavis Wald, blackmailed for indiscretion but turning the wrong way for help, and fabulous Broadway icon Rita Moreno as her best friend Dolores Gonzáles, cabaret dancer and go-between of the various parties.
Late sixties Los Angeles not as stylishly presented as in the contemporaneous Point Blank, it’s a city of sunshine and bright lights at night, as sanitised as the unseen killings, Marlowe pursuing a case convoluted and tangential, seeking connections between the disparate players and the shape in which all the pieces will fit together, leaving behind a trail of bodies which he ignores as much as he can, much to the chagrin of Archie Bunker himself, All in the Family’s Carroll O’Connor losing patience with Marlowe’s evasions and elisions as Lieutenant Christy French.
Restored from the original 35mm camera negative by Arrow, the bottom desk drawer of their new edition of Marlowe also contains the original trailer, a gallery of international posters and stills and $100 A Day (Plus Expenses), film historian Howard S Berger’s analysis of Chandler and Marlowe and the wider private detective genre, covering the history of the character through his many screen variations played by Dick Powell, Humphrey Bogart, Elliott Gould and Robert Mitchum, as well as associated films and characters within the wider investigation.
Marlowe is available on Blu-ray from Arrow now
