November 09, 2010 12:53:01 PM
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The Big Sleep -- novel (1939) & film (1946 version)
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Los Angeles, CA
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Unable to find video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjJlBnfyiI4.
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Chandler's novel -- in a popular and accessible genre -- exposes the endemic corruption and pessimism lurking beneath the shiny surfaces of American optimism. The 1946 film version maintains the same dark comic ambiance and transmutes the quest of the solo knight-detective into a dark romantic comedy -- personified by Bogart and Bacall. Following closely on the heels of the novel, the film proved that murder and comedy could inhabit the same plane, and, more importantly, that movies could be freed from plot -- as long as emotion and atmosphere are coherent.
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Roger
Comments [1]
I love this suggestion. I originally started to write something for this but couldn't quite state it as eloquently as Roger did. I might add that this may be the best of film noir and certainly one of it's greatest titles, namely a metaphor for death. What could be more hard boiled than that. Which the attachment that America has with crime fiction, this is a certainly great nominee.
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