|
|
|
Monday, March 22,2010 8:00 PM
|
|
THE BIG SLEEP
|
Pop Culture 101 - THE BIG SLEEP
Along with Murder, My Sweet (1944), The Big Sleep (1946) created a vogue for Raymond Chandler's work in Hollywood. It would be followed by film versions of The Blue Dahlia (1946), The High Window (as The Brasher Doubloon in 1947) and Lady in the Lake (also 1947).
In a bow to the General Sternwood character, Lauren Bacall played Lew Harper's wheelchair-bound employer in Harper (1966) which starred Paul Newman in the title role of the detective thriller.
The original 1945 version of The Big Sleep was only available in rare 16mm prints until 1996, when it was restored by Bob Gift of the UCLA Film & Television Archives. The new print premiered in Los Angeles in July 1996 and has aired on Turner Classic Movies (TCM).
Director Howard Hawks and writer Leigh Brackett would imitate Eddie Mars' death scene, in which he's shot down by his own henchmen after walking into a trap he'd set for someone else, in El Dorado (1966).
The Big Sleep was remade by director Michael Winner in 1978. He gave his film a contemporary setting and cast Robert Mitchum as Marlowe, Sarah Miles as Charlotte (originally Vivian), Candy Clark as Camilla (Carmen) and James Stewart as General Sternwood. Other actors featured in the remake included Joan Collins, Oliver Reed and John Mills. It was unanimously panned by the press.
Director Howard Hawks's work on The Big Sleep triggered a shift in his approach to filmmaking, leading to more leisurely, loosely plotted films in which character development and individual scenes take precedence over narrative coherence. He would later say, "I never figured out what was going on, but I thought that the basic thing had great scenes in it, and it was good entertainment. After that got by, I said, 'I'm never going to worry about being logical again'" (Quoted in Doug McClelland, Forties Film Talk.
The Big Sleep was way ahead of its time stylistically. Hawks's carefree approach to the mystery plot anticipated the work of such free-wheeling European directors as Jean-Luc Godard and François Truffaut.
by Frank Miller
 
|
|
|
|
 |
 |
31 Days of Oscar Highlights for Feb. 17
A baseball player (Robert De Niro) develops a terminal illness in Bang the Drum Slowly (1973), co-starring Vincent Gardenia in an Oscar®-nominated Supporting Actor performance. The lineup also includes Moonstruck (1987), Kramer vs. Kramer (1979), and other Academy honorees.
MORE >
|
|
TCM UK
| 
TCM Spain
| 
TCM France
| TCM Latin America
| TCM Asia
| TCM Germany
TCM.com is part of the Turner Sports and Entertainment Digital Network.
