The Big Sleep is based on Raymond Chandler's 1939 novel of the same name. Despite its widely regarded convoluted plot, The Big Sleep ranks among the best film noirs of all-time.Private detective Philip Marlowe (Humphrey Bogart) is summoned to the Sternwood mansion. He's welcomed by Norris the butler (Charles D. Brown) and meets Carmen Sternwood (Martha Vickers), the flirtatious and ditzy daughter of General Sternwood (Charles Waldron). Marlowe meets with wheelchair-bound, widower and millionaire, General Sternwood. He wants Marlowe to resolve the gambling debts that Carmen owes to bookseller Arthur Gwynn Geiger. He mentions Joe Brody, a gambler he once paid off and Sean Regen, an employee and friend who's gone missing. Before he leaves, he meets the alluring Vivian Rutledge (Lauren Bacall), Carmen's older divorced sister. She believes her father's true motive is to find Sean Regen.
Philip Marlowe's investigation leads him to pornographers, gamblers and blackmailers. He charms every woman he comes into contact with, leaving them aroused. Dorothy Malone plays a book store librarian in a tantalizing scene where she closes up shop after Marlowe sweet talks her. The romance between Marlowe and Vivian gets heated as the film progresses. Vivian works through the investigation with Marlowe, giving him leads and saving him along the way. They both play hard to get, raising the sexual tension until the climactic final words of the film. Marlowe is a rebel of sorts when it comes to detective work and effortlessly seduces every woman he meets. Vivian is mature and sophisticated compared to her younger sister Carmen, who throws herself at Marlowe every chance she gets.
The Big Sleep is directed by Howard Hawks. Hawks has many notable works such as one of the greatest comedies from the 1930s, Bringing Up Baby, and one of the best westerns of all-time, Rio Bravo. The camerawork is excellent and gives us every detail in a smooth fashion. The outdoors scenes are mostly rainy and gloomy.
The score is beautifully composed by Max Steiner. His musical résumé before The Big Sleep includes King Kong, Gone with the Wind and Casablanca. The score is masterful, as it sets the mood of each scene, building up tension and keeping us actively engaged.
The screenplay was written by three authors including Nobel Prize and two time Pulitzer Prize winner William Faulkner, as well as Leigh Brackett and Jules Furthman. The script is the major accomplishment of The Big Sleep because the film relies on its quick and intelligent dialogue. Bogart's consistently clever lines bring Marlowe's charming personality to life. "She tried to sit down in my lap when I was standing up." The screenplay was written around the Hays Code, the censorship policy that put restrictions on sexual themes. In the book, Geiger was selling pornography and he was in a gay relationship with his assistant Lundgren. Both selling pornography and references to homosexuality were prohibited. In the novel, Carmen appears nude in two scenes, but in the film, she is fully clothed. A scene that explains the plot towards the end with two characters, the police commissioner and the district attorney, was removed completely from the final version of the film.
Prior to The Big Sleep, Howard Hawks directed To Have and Not Have in 1944, starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall in her film debut. The chemistry between Bogart and Bacall is just one of many reasons to watch this film. They got married in 1945 when Bacall was 20 and Bogart was 45 and recently divorced. Bogart frequently missed days on set due to his depression and alcoholism following his divorce. They were together until Bogart's death in 1957.
The film was pre-released in 1945 but was revised and re-released in 1946 for a few reasons. Bacall's agent, Charles K. Feldman, requested many of Bacall's scenes to be re-shot in order to capture the chemistry between her and Bogart. The famous racehorse scene was added solely for that purpose. Many of Martha Vickers' scenes were removed to boost Bacall's performance.
The Big Sleep is a film noir well worth seeing. The plot allows the audience to piece the puzzle together with clues that can be interpreted depending on how you see it. It heavily influenced The Coen Brothers to create the 1998 cult classic, The Big Lebowski. I highly recommend The Big Sleep to adults and fans of film noir.
4/4
Supplements:
Opening Scene in Color
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