Review of The Big Sleep (1946) by Clark B — 08 Apr 2010

I finally watched this after avoiding it for years and yep, it sure is complicated. It's reputation for being convoluted is well earned. I think it has something to do with pornographic photographs and blackmail but don't quote me on that.

To my shame, most private eye stories confuse the hell out me. Invariably the private dick, the shamus, the gumshoe meets more and more people and I just fall further and further behind - I'm not even sure who the last person was and now he's talking to a new guy, some nightclub owner he puzzled out from a matchbook. The bodies pile up but it's okay, Marlowe just leaves 'em lay there, that's what they did in the '40s. Dead bodies were no big deal, no need to call the cops, that would be silly. Then Marlowe gets beat to an unconscious pulp by some goons but they don't kill him for narrative purposes and Lauren Bacall hovers around, but I don't know who she is. I think she might be one of the bad guys, but while I'm trying to figure that out here comes another hot dame. HEY! HOW MANY DIFFERENT WOMEN ARE IN THIS PICTURE? COME ON NOW, WHAT IN THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE? AHHHHH!

It's probably best not to overthink these kinds of pictures. The real appeal of "The Big Sleep" is the rat-a-tat dialog. Woman: "You're not very tall are you?" Bogart: "Well I, uh, I try to be." There's a million of those zingers and they're pretty sharp. Movies just don't have that of kind bounciness anymore and it's a shame. They used to churn that stuff out like a sausage factory in the '30s and '40s. It's a classic and I understand why people love it, but I cannot possibly give more than 60% termaters to a movie this baffling.