No Exit: The Long Goodbye (1978)
Robert Altman’s adaptation defined neo-noir…but did he take too many liberties with the book?
Critics define classic noir as movies made in the 1940’s and 1950’s, and the resurgence of interest in those movies created a sub-genre, known as neo-noir. While calling upon the same themes of noir films (good vs. evil, the corruption of society, the lure of sex and violence) the genre reflects both the changing social attitudes after the 1960’s and the director’s own personal style. Robert Altman is often credited for bring neo-noir to Hollywood with his adaptation of Raymond Chandler’s detective novel The Long Goodbye. His claim that he never read the book, as well as changes to the story, angered Chandler purists but created a trend for re-visiting noir that continues today.
The Story
Detective Philip Marlowe meets Terry Lenox outside a bar and the two become friends. One night, Terry Lenox arrives and asks Marlowe to drive him across the border to Tijuana. When he returns, he finds out that Lennox’s wife Sylvia has been found dead and is arrested because the police suspect he helped Lennox flee. He is released when it is reported that Lennox committed suicide in Mexico. When he returns home, Marlowe finds a $5000 bill and a cryptic note from Lennox. Marlowe is then hired to find missing author Roger Wade by his publisher and his wife Eileen. He finds Wade at a detox facility and the battling Wades try to convince him to stay at their house, and ends up separating them when he finds them struggling over a gun. Wade ends up dead and Marlowe must clear himself of suspicion while trying to uncover the truth about Terry Lennox and his past.
The Adaptation
The Long Goodbye is Raymond Chandler’s longest and perhaps most literary novel. It’s full of emotion, perhaps because Chandler wrote it while his wife was dying. For the first time, Philip Marlowe starts off with a personal stake in the story; Lennox is his friend and Marlowe is driven to find out what happened to him. Marlowe also bonds with Wade, who, with his troubles with alcohol and inability to write, stood in for Chandler, who was suffering more and more from writer’s block. The plot does bog down, and the coincidence of Marlowe’s second job connecting him back to Lennox can be a little hard to swallow. The characters and their complex relationships drive the novel forward, and Chandler is eloquent in his criticism of the idle rich and the society that enables them. It’s one of the rare detective novels where the mystery is less important than the lives and minds of its characters.
The original script for The Long Goodbye was written for Humphrey Bogart, perhaps screen’s most iconic Philip Marlowe. However, by the 1970’s, Bogart was dead and the script was considered too convoluted to film. Altman made it clear that he had no intention of reading the novel and intended to work off of Marlowe from the various movies. With the casting of Elliot Gould (hardly the archetype of a hard-boiled detective) he set about to create satire of the noir genre. The humor in this movie is often in Gould’s befuddled reactions to the bizarre events and characters he encounters; his response is always the same: “It’s alright by me.” The film uses soft edges to create a nostalgic look, often distracting the viewer from missed conversations as the constantly moving camera pans away. This world of The Long Goodbye is lethargic and uncertain; the characters lapse into long monologues and never really talk to each other.
The changes to the original story are numerous and controversial. Most obviously, the setting is the 1970’s rather than 1953; Marlowe’s personal code is a throwback and no longer relevant to the modern day. Characters, including Marlowe’s love interest, are removed and the identity and fate of the murderer is changed. Gould’s Marlowe is no tough guy; he is more of a befuddled loser who mutters to himself about his cat and is outclassed by the police and gangsters alike. Altman’s goal was de-romanticize noir and remove the toxic masculinity in the private eye genre. Perhaps the worst change is the end, which has Marlowe summarily executing the murderer and then strolling along a street playing a harmonica; Chandler fans were justifiably furious as Marlowe would never kill someone in cold blood; it was a betrayal of the character. One writer called it a “spit in the eye.”
Altman fans enjoy the movie and argue that he captured the spirit of the novel and Chandler’s critique of society’s corruption, rather than faithfully than simply recreating the mystery. Reviews were initially unfavorable, but in recent years, the movie has been considered a neo-noir classic and in keeping with Altman’s tendency to subvert traditional film genres. As an adaptation, the movie still outrages fans of the book; as a film, it is technically proficient, but still an acquired taste.
