The Doctor’s Diagnosis: B-
Marlowe marks the return of classic pulp detective character Philip Marlowe to the big screen. First introduced by author Raymond Chandler in the 1939 novel The Big Sleep, Marlowe has since appeared in dozens and dozens of novels, short stories, radio plays and films, with the most famous portrayal of the character being that of Humphrey Bogart in the 1946 adaptation of The Big Sleep (which was remade in 1978 with Robert Mitchum in the Marlowe role). There was even a prior film called Marlowe, with James Garner in the title role, but that 1969 production shares no plot details with this current entry. The point of this preamble is that Philip Marlowe was once a famous part of popular culture that fell largely into obscurity as the noir detective story fell out of fashion as a popular genre.
Being the old-fashioned and cranky bastard that I am, I love noir detective stories and I’m glad to see the character make a return (although, based on the box office returns, he still resides in obscurity). Marlowe doesn’t exactly revolutionize the genre and certainly won’t be remembered alongside classics like The Big Sleep and The Maltese Falcon. It doesn’t do anything new, and it certainly has production issues, but it’s a perfectly serviceable entry in the neglected genre and I am a sucker of this kind of thing. If you love old detective stories featuring a grizzled, hard-drinking, chain-smoking gumshoe investigating seedy characters in even seedier bars and nightclubs, then Marlowe is a solidly entertaining way to spend a couple of hours.
In his 100th movie role, Liam Neeson takes on the part of Marlowe. Based on the 2014 novel The Black-Eyed Blonde, Marlowe begins with a beautiful woman walking into a private detective’s office with a job for him and setups don’t get much more classic than that. One could argue that it’s horribly cliché, but if it’s good enough for both Sam Spade and Al Bundy, then it can still work. The woman is Clare, played by Diane Kruger, a wealthy socialite that is looking for her missing lover. Marlowe takes the case and discovers that the lover was supposedly killed in a hit-and-run outside of an exclusive nightclub, but Clare isn’t buying it and swears that she saw him alive after his supposed death. This naturally leads to a lengthy investigation into the Los Angeles nightlife, shady characters and enough plot twists to make you wish that you had brought a notebook to the theater.
The film’s biggest problem is the lack of authenticity that stems from some frankly bizarre production choices. The film is set in Los Angeles and that setting is integral to both the plot and the general ambiance of the genre, which, while certainly not uniquely American, is strongly engrained in the fabric of American cinema. It is baffling, then, that the film’s exteriors were shot in Barcelona and the interior scenes were filmed in Dublin. I expect that director Neil Jordan (probably best known for Interview with the Vampire) would argue that these choices add a vaguely otherworldly quality to the film, an element that has been used to great effect by Hitchcock, Fritz Lang and Orson Welles, to name a few, not to mention the mesmerizing insanity of David Lynch’s work in the neo-noir arena.
However, I call bullshit. There is a difference between establishing a dream-like quality for a film and simply filming on locations that make zero sense for the material. Aside from the fact that Barcelona and Dublin look nothing like Los Angeles, the overall look of the film doesn’t lend itself to the spirit of the genre. I am supposed to think that Marlowe is sleuthing his way through the underbelly of L.A., seeking clues in smoky nightclubs and interrogating people in dingy bars. Such a story in such locations is (again, while not uniquely American) a part of Americana that conjures images of a certain flavor. Barcelona is not that flavor. One does not picture a gumshoe downing a glass of bourbon in a “Los Angeles” bar and then sauntering to the Spanish coast. I imagine that these were financial decisions designed to lower the film’s budget rather than artistic choices, but, regardless of the motivation, they are unfortunate choices because this is a genre with such clearly-defined aesthetic tropes. It is, of course, possible for a film to defy such tropes to great effect, but there doesn’t really seem to be any artistic intent or achievement here in that regard.
The aesthetics might be lacking, but the character and story tropes are all certainly here. At 70 years old, Neeson pulls off the hard-boiled detective role well enough, even though it would have suited him better a decade or two ago. He is still an imposing figure and the role doesn’t require the physicality of his more action-oriented roles, so he is still able to pull it off and perhaps bring some gravitas to the part that would be missing with a younger actor. Diane Kruger plays the part of the femme fatale and is also believable in a very traditional role for this sort of thing. It was also wise to cast the 46 year old Kruger opposite Liam Neeson instead of some actress in her 20s. Kruger is still beautiful, and despite being 25 years younger than Neeson, makes the relationship between the two characters somewhat more palatable (while the age difference is still obvious, it isn’t as cringe-inducing as, say, watching 24 year old Carole Bouquet with 55 year old Roger Moore in For Your Eyes Only). The mystery itself is solid, if not particularly imaginative, with enough twists to keep one entertained. The film doesn’t do any of these things spectacularly well, but it does all of them well enough.
This kind of noir detective story is like the cinematic equivalent of pizza for me. Some pizza is better than others, sure, but I rarely find pizza that I truly regret ordering. Marlowe is like a decent slice of pizza. It’s not revolutionary, but I don’t need it to be Vertigo to have a good time with it. If you like this sort of thing, it is a perfectly acceptable way to spend a couple of hours. If you haven’t seen the other films that I mentioned as comparison points, you should start with those instead.
Image By: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marlowe_(2022_film)#/media/File:Marlowe_(2022_film).png
