Poetic Movie Review: The Big Sleep

Dorothy Malone

is the reason why

I never leave home

without a pocketful of rye

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Let’s get this straight. Two complete strangers, a “fattish” detective and an alluringly bookish bookseller opportunistically find themselves alone, on a rainy afternoon, with nothing to do except share an opportunistic bottle of rye (who doesn’t carry one of those in their pocket) and for no good plot-related reason I can come up with, they have sex – yes, right there on the books, we presume – and then it’s “so long, pal”.

And it’s 1946. I didn’t know people actually had sex in 1946.

Well, it makes no sense to me, but like many classic-era Noirs – and The Big Sleep is nearly definitive – sometimes you love it for the style, not always the story. Even Raymond Chandler famously couldn’t explain the plot, and all he did was write the thing.

Regardless, this is an enchanting scene in a movie filled with them – delicious photography, atmosphere, repartee, sexuality, and glorious subtlety (when filmmakers assumed an American audience possessed the intellect to read between the lines). So, maybe you don’t always need logic and plot – sometimes you can just let yourself be charmed.

Poetic Movie Review – The Best Years of Our Lives

I wish they would make

more like this

once in a while

artistry

without scorn

about universal things

that matter

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I love this movie and I love this scene – it’s the penultimate moment before Dana Andrews walks among the bones of old bombers and confronts – in some sense – his ghosts of the war.

While the bomber scene that follows is rightly considered one of the most powerful in movie history – an extraordinary exposition of sound and image and, it its way, recovery- it’s made even more profound by this personal one that leads up to it.

I’m not sure we should glorify the sacrifices that people make in war, but I do think we should honor them, especially in a righteous cause. This quiet scene, painted by light and shadow, encapsulates that idea with measured grace – the pride in a father’s face (so compellingly portrayed by Roman Bohnen), the catch in his throat as holds his emotions, and the compassion in his wife’s eyes (the always captivating Gladys George), which convey paragraphs without a word – this is masterful movie acting, and movie making, in one of the great films.