Re: RARA-AVIS: Re: The Long Goodbye

From: Terrill Lankford ( lankford2000@earthlink.net)
Date: 11 Feb 2007


-----Original Message-----
>From: jimdohertyjr < jimdohertyjr@yahoo.com>
>Sent: Feb 11, 2007 5:10 PM
>To: rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com
>Subject: RARA-AVIS: Re: The Long Goodbye
>
>dave,
>
>Re your comments below:
>
>
>
>> "If you don't go in expecting Chandler or a straight detective
>yarn,
>> you may well fall madly in love with this oddball Long Goodbye. Not
>> Altman's "best" or most ambitiously original work, but definitely
>my
>> favorite."
>>
>> A corollary to this statement I guess would be if you go in
>expecting
>> Chandler you may well madly hate this film...
>
>And I do. Not only because I was expecting Chandler, but because I
>thought, and think, that I had every right to expect Chandler, and
>that Altman had NO right to shit all over this perfectly just
>expectation.

I can't believe he didn't consult with you before filming commenced.

Sounds like you'd like to get your hands on him and make him pay for the oversight.

I can't believe that scamp got away with another one. He was a wiley sumbitch.

And while you may hate the movie, Altman, and perhaps even cats, I don't think you can honestly make a claim that he defecated on you or your expectations since he didn't know you at the time.

(I would like to think Altman might quote Marlowe (as spoken to Marty Augustine) if he had been given the option though, "I wouldn't think of doing that. Maybe some other time, though, you know.")

>
>> Like Terrill, I don't necessary take Altman thinking of Marlowe as
>> a loser as a negative or an indication that Altman was trying to
>> disparage Chandler's work. Hell, Rockford Files, which I always saw
>> as the heir apparent to Marlowe, had Jimbo pretty much as a loser
>> also, but in a sympathetic way, somewhat endearing way.
>
>Altman disparaged Chandler treatment of the character, and, whether
>or not Altman finds losers sympathetic isn't the point. The point is
>Marlowe is NOT a loser.

He's says he is at the end of the movie. He even says that he lost his cat.

But he still gets the last shot in. Isn't that good for something?

Looks like he's the winner to me. As much as he can be one in the world in which he lives.

>
>And, while you're right about Jim being an heir apparent to Marlowe,
>it's not Gould's Marlowe he's heir to, but Garner's own turn as the
>character in the film version of THE LITTLE SISTER, and infinitely
>better movie than TLG, for all that it's much less ambitious.
>

Now you're talking crazy talk. The only thing that movie has going for it is the first scene with Bruce Lee. (The second scene is incredibly stupid.)

That movie is good evidence that Altman was right.

It's tolerable, but pedestrian.

>And you misread Rockford if you see him as a loser. He triumphs much
>more often than he loses. He's handy with dukes. He's handy with
>his gun. He's fast-talking and fast-thinking. And he's really
>damned good at basic detective work. Sure he takes his lumps, but he
>bounces back. He lives life on his own terms and is basically
>happy. Finally, speaking as one who was blessed with a great dad, no
>one who has a father like Rocky is a loser. And no one who can go
>through the experience of being convicted of a crime he didn't commit
>and emerge with as positive an attitude as Rockford does is a
>loser.
>
>Gould's Marlowe, by way of sharp contrast, is none of these things.
>He's just an ineffectual nebbish who spends most of the movie getting
>pushed around while muttering that, "It's OK with me."
>
>JIM DOHERTY

That may be his mantra through most of the film, but by the end I think we all understand that it WASN'T okay with him.

Perhaps you take dialogue too literally. Occasionally, in more complex works, people say things they do not mean. And mean things they do not say.

TL



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