I found it to be completely derivative of "The Big Sleep,"
and "The Long
Goodbye." If I recall correctly, it was almost a perfect
combination of
the two, plotwise like the BS, tonally like the LG, although
the Newman
P.I character is weaker and more burnt-out than Marlowe. In
fact, it was
so blatent a reworking that I sussed out the heavy upon
first
introduction. Anybody "hep" to the detective genre would
figure it out
immediately.
However, it still is a character driven vehicle. With Newman,
Sarandan,
etc, how unwatchable could it be? Although Benton has made
some fine
films, let's not forget "Still Of the Night" which was a
mannered
Hitchcock rip-off. Sometimes he's so entralled by the genre,
that he
forgets to try to expand upon the accepted idiom.
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