The Big Sleep (1978)

Too many fans seem to be blown away

This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

Dreadfully Boring

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

1970's England. Aging and cynical private eye Philip Marlowe (superbly played with world-weary grace by Robert Mitchum) gets hired by the frail and crippled General Sternwood (a moving performance by Jimmy Stewart) to investigate a blackmail scheme that proves to be much more complicated than it initially seems to be.Writer/director Michael Winner relates the intricate and involving story at a steady pace, maintains an appropriately seamy tone throughout (such risqué subject matter as porn and homosexuality gets depicted with unwavering explicitness), stages the action set pieces with aplomb, treats the material in a respectful manner without ever resorting to either condescending kitsch or sentimental nostalgia, and makes neat use of the London locations. Sarah Miles really sinks her teeth into the juicy role of tart and conniving gambling addict Charlotte Sternwood. Alas, Candy Clark goes way too over the top with her hysterical portrayal of unstable nymphet Camilla. Fortunately, the strong supporting cast more than compensates for this, with especially stand-out contributions from Richard Boone as the brutish Lash Camino, Oliver Reed as fearsome mobster Eddie Mars, Harry Andrews as loyal butler Norris, Edward Fox as smarmy book maker Joe Brody, and especially Joan Collins as the ruthless Agnes Lozelle. Robert Paynter's slick cinematography provides a pleasing glossy look. Jerry Fielding's funky-throbbing score hits the right-on groovy spot. Worth a watch.

A strange creature is Michael Winner...Has he been secretly mocking the 'industry' he works in for the past fifty years? Or is he just a pompous old fool who couldn't make a public information film? Perhaps no one will ever know!The big sleep however, is one of Winner's better films. Largely due to a great script (he adheres closely to the book despite the film being set in England) and the superb acting of Robert Mitchum. The best bit in the film is watching Mitchum and a comely Joan Collins rolling around on the carpet; After taking her pistol, a dishevelled Mitchum looks on whilst Collins lets out an orgasmic sign and then lights a ciggy, great stuff!

One of Michael Winner's best movies.To many,that may seem to be damning "The Big Sleep" with faint praise,but in fact the much - maligned Mr Winner made two of the most interesting British movies of the 1960s,"The Jokers" and "West 11" and the highly individualistic "I'll never forget whats'isname" before setting out on a career path aimed perhaps at pleasing his accountants rather than the critics few of whom would forgive him for being so successful so young. He clearly divides opinion very strongly,fortunately for some of his detractors he does not appear particularly litiginous by nature. As a man who courts controversy he must have realised that re-making an iconic movie was going to be a risky enterprise.Nothing if not headstrong,he re-cast Mr R. Mitchum - the man actually preferred by Chandler - as Marlowe,albeit a Marlowe for the late 70s,smart,cool, confident and smooth.With power suits and an excellent set of wheels,Mitchum's Marlowe was designed to bear absolutely no resemblance to his predecessor's.In a further act of rashness Winner discarded the "Smart - mouth" dialogue that was in fact far from Chandler's slightly puritan style but which over the years had become associated with the movie to the extent that many of the audience assumed he himself had written it. Instead he settled for an honest - to - goodness straightforward rendering of the subject featuring an almost Lear - like General Sternwood and his two strange daughters. Some of Mr Winner's favourite actors appear and,continuing with the perhaps rather tenuous Shakespeare analogy,Mr R.Boone is as gleefully evil and limping as Olivier's King Richard. A good story is a good story,and to my mind "The Big Sleep" does not suffer from being set in England,indeed it could equally as well be set in Paris or Dublin. If Mr Winner was a shy,retiring, hermit - like creature no one would ever go and see his movies - a fact that would not please his accountants at all.

Who can make tasteless, dull, silly movies? Who can bother you by the stupidest cuts in one scene? Who can light dumbly everything and everyone like the worst TV work yet in cinematic movies? Who can move the whole cast as robots without so much meaning ? Who can bring the wooden performance out of all the actors, even the big names ? Who can direct the highest spiritless scenes ever ? Who can manage to write the most mechanical scripts, with the unfunniest lines? Who got the passion for harsh sex and violence on the screen ? Who got no sense of humor or maybe no sense? Who can annoy you with a style has no style at all ? Who can make movies to be learned at Film schools as the prototype of "don't do that again" ? And finally, who got the talent of deforming an American classic movie? So can bore you to death with what's supposed to be a thriller ? Ladies and Gentleman, I give to you the Winner himself : Mr. Michael Winner, who with him you'll always lose ! P.S : I think that's more merciful than other comment I wanted to write, about such a movie, which I intended to entitle "How To Explode a Movie By Dynamite ?!"