I went back to the Chandler letters and found one from May
30, 1946 to Hamish Hamilton regarding Bogart as Marlowe. From
the letter, it appears he saw an early cut of the picture but
prior to some reshooting by director Howard Hawks. He had
great praise for Hawks and said he could compliment the movie
"since I had nothing to do with it. I say this with some
faint regret. Well, that's not exactly true because Hawks
time after time got dissatisfied with his script and would go
back to the book and shoot scenes straight out of it."
I would want to see verification of the go back to the book
and "shoot scenes straight out of it." While it may be true,
it is also the sort of thing someone might say to Chandler to
compliment him or he might have imagined after seeing the
early cut. For what it is worth, I recall the same thing
written about John Houston's filming "The Maltese Falcon"
with a copy of the novel in hand.
Anyway, here is what Chandler wrote to Hamish Hamilton about
the movie and Bogart:
"When and if you see "The Big Sleep" (the first half of it
anyhow) you will realize what can be done with this sort of
story by a director with the gift of atmosphere and the
requisite touch of hidden sadism. Bogart, of course, is also
so much better than any other tough-guy actor that he makes
bums of the Ladds and the Powells. As we say here, Bogart can
be tough without a gun. Also he has a sense of humor that
contains that grating undertone of contempt. Ladd is hard,
bitter and occasionally charming, but he is after all a small
boy's idea of a tough guy. Bogart is the genuine
article."
Richard Moore
--- In
rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com, "Juri Nummelin"
<juri.nummelin@...> wrote:
>
> Dick Powell is very good in MURDER, MY SWEET and is
shabby in the
right way,
> but there's a scene in which he has only his
undershirt on (and his
slacks,
> too) and a dame comes in and starts to tell
Powell/Marlowe how
great looking
> he is, strong and all that. And Powell really has
this quite big
belly and
> rather thin arms! Even I have more muscles than Dick
Powell. It's a
scene
> that I'd cut away from the movie or build Powell
some muscles with
digital
> effects.
>
> As for Cary Grant, I've been thinking about that for
almost 20
years. (I
> read Chandler's letters while still 17 or 18.) It's
a pretty hard
image, but
> I think Grant could've pulled it off. He just
couldn't have been so
suave as
> he usually was. Hey, James Stewart is a pretty tough
noir guy in
Anthony
> Mann's westerns, and look at him in Capra's
films.
>
> Juri
>
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