Raymond Chandler

Many of you know this...I'm an audiobook fan.  I had a moment of doubt about them initially when I realized that the reader and director/producer are influencing my interpretation of the characters by giving them voices and my interpretation of the story by their vocal inflections,  but once I reconciled that I was ALL IN.  I have no doubt that I am influenced but mostly I feel that its an enhancement much like a film's interpretation of a story. (And some folks - you know who you are - question how you can skim through parts in an audiobook.  You can.  The technical term for it is  "napping" ;)

Recently I chose to listen to Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep, primarily because the reader, Ray Porter, is one of my favorites (and it was on sale).  Wow it was awesome. It turns out I hadn't read any Chandler (I thought I had but I think I was getting him confused with Jim Thompson) and I have to tell you, I kind of fell in love.  I have been a longtime fan of pulp fiction and film noir, most notably Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon - both book and film - and I guess I was expecting it to be in a similar vein.  The vein might be similar but the blood is WAY different.  (Apologies for that terrible metaphor.)

His style is masculine, terse, sarcastic, wry, witty, elegant, poetic.  Nearly every phrase he writes is quotable.  His dialog is amazing. Chandler's main character, Philip Marlowe, seems less jaded than Sam Spade which makes him a bit more accessible.

Chandler wrote a often quoted critical essay about crime drama in 1944 called The Simple Art of Murder.  He describes his thoughts on Marlowe which sums up exactly what I'm thinking but much more eloquently:  "a complete man and a common man and yet an unusual man.  He must be, to use a rather weathered phrase, a man of honor - by instinct, by inevitability, without thought of it and certainly without saying it.  He must be the best man in his world and good enough for any world.  I do not care much about his private life; he is neither a eunuch nor a satyr; I think he might seduce a duchess and I am quite sure he would not spoil a virgin; if he is a man of honor in one thing, he is that in all things."

Interesting coming from a guy who was kind of a mess.  He lost jobs due to alcoholism (my favorite thing is he insisted he write the entire last act of The Black Dahlia while blind drunk and the studio went for it!) and only wrote 7 novels plus a smattering of short stories and screenplays.  

He was also sarcastic as fuck in his real life.  As a girl who nicknames most of her coworkers, I appreciate a man who, because he wasn't a fan of hers, called Veronica Lake "Moronica Lake". Heh.

Another thing I love about him is his wife was a total cougar - she was 18 years his senior!  Go, Cissy Chandler!

Plus, cat lover!!

Anyway, Ray Porter also read the audiobook for Farewell My Lovely as well, so I decided to listen to both then watch both the films.  Here you have it.

The Big Sleep - book published in 1939, film released in 1946

First thing to note: They smoke so much in this film I thought I was going to get emphysema just from watching.

Second thing to note: The book has some severely antiquated views regarding homosexuality.  One must read (listen) with an eye to the era in which it was written.

Third thing to note: Since when does it rain all the fucking time in LA?  Did this happen more in the 1930's than it does now?  What up??

Favorite quote from the book:  When Carmen is crawling around trying to grab a gun off the floor Marlowe says,  "Get up, Angel.  You look like a Pekinese."

Raymond Chandler's stories in general are pretty convoluted (he's heavy on stylized, awesome writing, light on plot), so the film tries to streamline this.  I actually like the ending in the book a bit more than the film version, it's grittier and more fucked up.

Howard Hawks directed this and William Faulkner actually wrote the screenplay.

It's a mystery with a gumshoe detective and duplicitous women who need his help.  Classic pulp fiction; the actual plot is almost incidental. 

Humphrey Bogart plays Philip Marlowe and Lauren Bacall plays the femme fatale, Vivian.  This is the second film Bogart and Bacall are in together and WOW can you see their chemistry.  It's electric.  Apparently they had filmed To Have and Have Not (also directed by Hawks) and had started their affair on that film.  They were already filming The Big Sleep when THAHN was released.  The response to Bogie and Bacall was so great that they ended up re-editing The Big Sleep with some juicier scenes to capitalize on the relationship.  The Big Sleep was actually released two years after they were married.  They have an amazing story actually - May/December romance, truly the love of each other's lives.  You should Google them and look at pics when they are together.  Who knew Bogie smiled?  It's simply heartwarming.

I also credit my film school education and mother's love of movies with knowing that the guy who played the ill-fated Harry Jones in The Big Sleep was also in The Maltese Falcon as one of the best characters - the wimpy, weepy Wilmer Cook - Joel Cairo's (Peter Lorre) thug/boyfriend.  Elisha Cook Jr. was one of the great character actors of the time.  He's really awesome in both films. 

(My drink pairing for this film is two fingers of cheap whisky.  From your "office bottle".)

Murder My Sweet (book title: Farewell My Lovely) -  book published in 1940, film released in 1944

First thing to note:  this film actually came out BEFORE The Big Sleep, so Dick Powell was the original Philip Marlowe on film.

Second thing to note:  They changed the title because Dick Powell was a singer/dancer and the studios thought that Farewell My Lovely might be mistaken for a musical because the name is...whimsical?  Whatevs.

Third thing to note:  This book keeps the antiquated ideas coming but this time about race.  Sigh.

Favorite quote from the book:  I have two (out of the MANY)

1 - "Even on Central Avenue, not the quietest dressed street in the world, he looked about as inconspicuous as a tarantula on a slice of angel food."

2 - "She gave me a smile I could feel in my hip pocket."

This movie takes quite a leap away from the book.  The beginning and end are both significantly different.  There is a weird middle section where Marlowe is in a hospital getting pumped full of drugs which they kept in - I'm thinking they kept this because they got to do bizarro "special effects" like a filter over the lens to create a "web" effect and some awesome multiple-door layered effect with the doctor moving through the doors like a ghost.  Innovative for the time.  Not so much now.

The films keep Chandler's wry sense of humor, which is good.  In this film, Marlowe strikes his match on the ass of a Cupid statue. That actually made me LOL.

Also, you always have to hand it to old films to get a beat on the fashions of the day. It's actually alarming how high Dick Powell's pants are (see below) and my theory is that is why they had to shorten tie lengths back then - to compensate. 

(My drink pairing for this is less drink but still mind-altering - smoke a marijuana cigarette (to use Chandler's vernacular). I'm sure it will make that hospital scene infinitely more palatable.)

My takeaways:

#1 - I took a Film Noir class in college (which might have been the point I realized that I loved being a film major) and it was probably my favorite class ever.

#2 - Another class I took was Family Melodrama.  The film I remember most was Magnificent Obsession (Rock Hudson/Jane Wyman)- and one of the main characters was in Murder My Sweet - an actor named Otto Kruger.  He was almost godlike in Magnificent Obsession, but he was definitely a bad guy in Murder My Sweet.

#3 - Someday I'll have to do a post on Noir films specifically.  SUCH a great genre.

xoxo...hashtagSueslife

I'm ready for my close up, Mr DeMille

Hi gang!  

First of all, I recently realized that this blog is a year old!  I am humbled and honored that anyone AT ALL is still reading it!  You guys are seriously the best.

Another thing that honors me is when anyone feels they want to join me in this endeavor.  

So for this post, I am VERY happy to present my blogguest, the inimitable Lisa Franklin. We have known each other for probably 25 years now (maybe a bit more but a girl doesn't have to divulge ALL her secrets).  We bonded over old movies and crazy evenings in shitty SF music clubs.  She writes beautifully and has an amazing sense of humor, as you will see below.  

She is a person that makes me laugh so hard I ache and fills me with love.

Here, she gifts us with a glimpse into a family tradition.

xoxo....hashtagSueslife

The Ten Commandments

Passover in my family always involves several rituals.  When my children were small, no Seder service was complete without the re-enacting of the plagues.  Each plate had a paper bag next to it full of afflictions and scourges.  At the appropriate time during the Passover dinner when reading out loud about the plagues, we would reach into our bags and then…  Mayhem reigned!!  Ping-pong balls were thrown at each other across the table while we recited “fiery hail”!  “Three days of darkness” – don your sunglasses!  Rubber bugs were bandied about (sometimes onto plates of Gifilte fish (ick), and haroset (yum!) during “pestilence”.  The little plastic cows we each had next to our plates were knocked over during “livestock disease”.  Frogs were flung and imaginary lice were scratched! 

Another ritual was equally as important to our family:  the watching of Cecil B. DeMille’s “The Ten Commandments” (1956).  It was on TV every year around the time of Passover and Easter.  Years ago during the kids’ Easter break, when we were all on vacation in Raleigh, N.C. - all 5 of us piled into one room in a Motel 6 eating Ramen made in the coffee maker - we turned on the T.V., and there it was!!  As dependable as an argument over pool toys!

And this spring, to our absolute delight, my daughter and I were privileged to see all 3 hours and 39 minutes of this movie spectacle (presented by TMC) on the big screen!  The film was shown how it was originally presented in movie theaters in 1956 - Cecil B. Demille came on the screen first talking about the extensive research that went into the film.  The film score included a musical prelude, intermission, and audience exit music.  

Charlton Heston and Yul Brynner play the two warring brothers fighting not only for their father’s attentions, but those of Nefretiri, played lusciously by Anne Baxter. Charlton is at his chiseled best as Moses.  Yul Brynner, at his uber-manliest, plays the pharaoh, Ramses.  Woo friggin’ hoo!  Head shaved, he struts, he poses, his muscles bulge and pecs glisten as he refuses to let Moses’ people go.  Anne Baxter is magnificent as the lover of young Moses (the fun Moses – before he has that chat with the burning bush and becomes absolutely no fun at all.)

The Pharoah’s daughter is childless and plucks a basket from the river.  In it is a baby (played by Heston’s real son), an infant set onto the Nile because Ramses’ father (Pharaoh, Sr.) issued an edict that all first born male babies should be put to death.  The pharoah’s advisors had warned Pharoah, Sr. that a Jewish leader had been born that would free all the slaves.  Pharoah takes no chances and orders all Jewish male babies murdered. Moses’ mother sets baby Heston afloat.

Moses grows into the manly man of Charlton Heston.  Ramses hates Moses because he is favored by Ramses’ father and Ramses fears that Moses will be chosen as the next ruler of Egypt.

Anne Baxter’s Nefretiri is promised to Ramses, but she has the hots for Moses in a big way.  Apparently saying Moses’ name 2 times in a row in a low husky voice in every other sentence while clasping his oiled biceps is the best way to display her passion.  (“Oh, Moses, Moses, you stubborn, splendid, adorable fool!”) Baxter is costumed in rich, flowing fabrics and jewelry and owns the screen, big or small, when she steps onto it.  She is, by far, my favorite character.

Ten Commandment Tidbits

•  10 years in the planning, 3 years in research, 3 years in writing and more than a year in the actual shooting, this version was the biggest undertaking in the history of film at that time.  At least 14,000 extras and 15,000 animals were used in the film.
•  Edward G. Robinson (who was actually blacklisted at the time) plays Dathan, the slimey slave trader
• What???  Lily Munster (Yvonne DeCarlo) plays Moses’ shepherdess wife, Sephora.
• Notice the short but illuminating interaction between Nefretiri and Moses’ wife bonding over the fact that once Moses had that tete a tete with the burning bush, his reed for both of the women went limp:

Nefretiri: You need have no fear of me. 
Sephora: I feared only his memory of you. 
Nefretiri: You have been able to erase it. 
Sephora: He has forgotten both of us. You lost him when he went to seek his God. I lost him when he found his God.

• Yul Brynner did extensive weight lifting, since in many scenes he would be bare chested (and we thank Yah-weh for every scene).
•  “Every year since 1973, the American TV network ABC airs this film on Easter, or Passover. In 1999, when for some reason ABC chose not to televise it, they received numerous irate phone calls from people accustomed to watching it every Easter than they have for any other film they have ever telecast.” - Wikipedia
• The parting of the Red Sea took 3 years to execute and one million dollars of the film’s thirteen million dollar budget.
• There is a 1923 silent version of “The Ten Commandments” also directed by Cecil B. DeMille.  Because it was filmed prior to the 1930 Hayes Code (which put restrictions on film for “morality” reasons) it is supposed to be pretty racey.  Breasts popping out of thin fabrics, titillating sexuality. 
• Charlton Heston talked DeMille into using his own voice for the voice of God.  Heston believed Moses would have heard God’s voice in his own head. 
• According to Charlton Heston's autobiography, the filming of the orgy scenes was so arduous that one disgruntled female extra exclaimed, "Who do I have to f*** to get OUT of this movie?"

Watch this extravaganza while feasting on Matzah (unleavened bread) and Haroset (chopped apples, nuts, and wine).  Best paired with a 2016 Manischewitz Concord Grape Wine.  Le Chaim!