rockyandbullwinkle What a great film! I love the snappy lines of film noir and this film did not disappoint :) It got a little convoluted in one part but overall held together pretty well.

JohnHowardReid By contrast with 1973's extremely disappointing "The Long Goodbye", directed by Robert Altman, 1975's "Farewell, My Lovely" had both movie critics and Marlowe fans rejoicing. The direction reveled in atmospheric ambiance, while the acting from stars to bit-players pegged close to perfection. In the lead role, Robert Mitchum made a surprisingly persuasive fist of a sardonic, world-weary Marlowe, a-drift in realistically tawdry 1940's art deco sets. In fact, Mitchum proved so believably charismatic in the part, that director Michael Winner signed him to reprise his impersonation in a re-make of "The Big Sleep" (1978). (Available on an excellent 10/10 Lions Gate DVD).

inspectors71 If it weren't for the always watchable Robert Mitchum, the cool clothes, the lumbering Detroitmobiles, and the smoke and booze flowing like a river, Dick Richards' Farewell, My Lovely would collapse from the clichés, the incoherences, and the feeling that the movie is visually dark to add atmosphere while hiding the fact that the movie was made 30+ years after the book was published.I tried to get mad at this mess, but I just couldn't. It felt cheap, but paying attention to that basset hound of a man, Robert Mitchum, make Charlotte Rampling's greedy whore laugh, a nice touch indeed.I saw FML when it came out in the summer of 1975, and I lucked on it when a senior of mine said she had a couple boxes of VHS tapes that her mom wanted gone. I took 'em, and there was Mitchum on the box cover, looking tough, with a curl of smoke pooling under the brim of his fedora. Look at that! The movie--or Raymond Chandler--brings out the turn of phrase in the hacks among us.

tomsview "Farewell My lovely" is a pretty good take on Raymond Chandler's novel, and Robert Mitchum makes a great screen Marlowe; he's a little older and a little more weather-beaten than Bogart in the role. Interestingly, Chandler always thought Cary Grant would have been the right choice for the part - who'd have thought? Set around 1940, Marlowe gets involved in two cases that eventually join together. Moose Malloy, played by ex-heavyweight boxer Jack O'Halloran, hires him to find Velma, the girlfriend he hasn't seen in seven years - he's been 'in the can'.Marlowe is also hired to find jewellery belonging to rich old Judge Grayle (Jim Thompson) and his sexy young wife Helen (Charlotte Rampling). The body count mounts as the strands come together and Marlowe expounds his world-weary philosophies on just about everything. The film is peppered with characters that have been dealt a bad hand by life, but they are people Marlowe relates to.It was uncomfortable to get on the wrong side of Mitchum. He seemed to have built in radar that detected any kind of pretence and his comments in an interview with Roger Ebert about the director of the film, Dick Richards, were harsh.He also didn't seem to feel the mystique of Charlotte Rampling, dismissing her, according to Lee Server's biography of Mitchum, as "the chick who did the S&M movie 'The Night Porter'". However Charlotte Rampling, clothed and styled to recall Lauren Bacall, brings an enigmatic quality to her role, the camera loves her in her few short scenes.The film has a similar retro feel to "Chinatown". Both had great scores, and David Shire didn't spare the alto sax creating an evocative work to rival Jerry Goldsmith.Marlowe as played by Mitchum is a guy who knows deep truths about human nature; he's been knocked around and has felt pain - he understands you even if he has to shoot you. It's a quality that works well in this 40-year old movie.