A Comparison of Two Versions of The Big Sleep
The Production Code attempted to censor sex and violence in film of the 1930's and 40's. Instead of impairing, it encouraged directors to use artistic ideas and integrity to surpass the viewers' expectations -- actively involving them in the film despite Hollywood's censorship. Howard Hawks is one such director who used the restrictions of the Production Code to his advantage. His screen adaptation of the Raymond Chandler novel The Big Sleep portrays the same amount of sexuality and violence apparent in the written word, using a distinctly subtle style, which develops broader themes. Comparisons with the extremely dull 70's remake by Michael Winner further suggest the superiority of Hawks' film noir. While Hawks masterfully creates an original world of sexuality and suspense, Winner unsuccessfully focuses on violent and sexual images in a vain attempt at filmmaking.
There is not a trace of nudity in Hawks' The Big Sleep, yet it thrives on sex. The viewer will not catch a glimpse of a buttock, nipple nor a whole breast. This scarcity of skin is attributed to the superb screenplay writers Leigh Brackett, William Faulkner and Jules Furthman. They depict a charming Marlowe, played by Humphrey Bogart, interacting with various frisky femmes exhibiting innuendo that brilliantly illuminates the screen.
Marlowe and the Acme Bookstore clerk flirt with an elegance even the slyest viewer would envy. The scholastic seductress flashes her beautiful eyes at him saying, "You begin to interest me, vaguely." Bogie's response -- "I'm a private dick on a case." With a loud, tumultuous clap of thunder, the audience sits bolt upright, anticipating the sultry shenanigans to ...
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...blood trickles down their faces. There is no cohesion between the death scenes; Eddie Mars does not die in this version, so there is no build up or statement made.
At a first glance, it is obvious that the two films, with 32 years between them, are quite different in style and theme. No matter when the film is viewed, Howard Hawks' film engages the audience presenting interesting themes in a sleek, stylistic fashion. His version may contain a limited amount of bare skin and violence, but proves that these inclusions are unnecessary if the film has voice and direction. To Winner, there is no direction or voice. He makes a hollow shell of a film extracting Chandler's exact scenes, harnessing the nudity and violence instead of the deeper themes that stand out in Hawks'.
Works Consulted:
Chandler, Raymond. The Big Sleep. New York: Random House, 1939.
Chris was unique compared to others, but he was not insane in any sense of the word. He led a journey to Alaska based on emotional reasons and motivations. Chris went into the wild looking for freedom and answers to his questions. Ultimately, Chris found what he was looking for emotionally and went to leave the wild, but in an unfortunate turn of events and a lack of preparedness, Chris mistimed his departure and was stuck in the wild. Eventually, because of his lack of local knowledge and resources, Chris never left the Alaskan wilderness
The painting is organized simply. The background of the painting is painted in an Impressionist style. The blurring of edges, however, starkly contrasts with the sharp and hard contours of the figure in the foreground. The female figure is very sharp and clear compared to the background. The background paint is thick compared to the thin lines used to paint the figures in the foreground. The thick paint adds to the reduction of detail for the background. The colors used to paint the foreground figures are vibrant, as opposed to the whitened colors of the Impressionist background. The painting is mostly comprised of cool colors but there is a range of dark and light colors. The light colors are predominantly in the background and the darker colors are in the foreground. The vivid color of the robe contrasts with the muted colors of the background, resulting in an emphasis of the robe color. This emphasis leads the viewer's gaze to the focal part of the painting: the figures in the foreground. The female and baby in the foreground take up most of the canvas. The background was not painted as the artist saw it, but rather the impression t...
When Chris left for his journey he wasn’t crazy or stupid as many would say. “McCandless went into the wilderness not primarily to ponder nature or the world at large, but rather to explore the inner country of his own soul” pg. 183. The fact that Chris never bother to discuss his Alaskan walk about with his anyone especially his parents wasn’t intentional. However throughout the whole book it was made very clear that he was at odds with his parents in some way to go off on his journey but he didn’t want to hurt them, which I think Walt and Billie finally realized visiting the bus where Chris had passed. I think Chris just wanted to get away from his everyday life, clear his mind, a mind that didn’t involve the worries of expectations and the thoughts of his parents hanging on his shoulders.
Film Noir is a genre of distinct and unique characteristics. Mostly prominent in the 40s and 50s, the genre rarely skewed from the skeletal plot to which all Film Noir pictures follow. The most famous of these films is The Big Sleep (1946) directed by Howard Hawks. This film is the go to when it comes to all the genre’s clichés. This formula for film is so well known and deeply understood that it is often a target for satire. This is what the Coen brothers did with 1998’s The Big Lebowski. This film follows to the T what Film Noir stands for.
It is a concurrent agreement in the film industry that Alfred Hitchcock is nothing less than a legend when it comes to the suspense and thriller genres of film. That being said, many filmmakers unsurprisingly aspire to adopt his style in more recent films. Movie critique Andrew O’Hehir suspects that this is the case with Mark Pellington’s production, Arlington Road, which follows the story of a man taken with the idea that his neighbors are terrorists. Although Pellington’s production possesses distinctively Hitchcock-styled qualities in its editing, storyline, and themes, O’Hehir argues that it is “…ultimately just another maddeningly ill-conceived tribute placed at [Hitchcock’s] feet.” However, it cannot be determined if Pellington meant for Arlington Road to be a tribute at all. The film may have a multitude of resemblances to Hitchcock film, but its finale fundamentally distinguishes itself unique to O’Hehir’s assumption.
In response to Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep, I have just one question. Why all the similes? There isn't a single page in the novel that doesn't display this annoying literary device. Everything is "like this" or "like that." It never ends! Similar to decoding a secret message that isn't difficult to understand, but nevertheless tiring due to the overwhelming amount of messages, the novel is frustrating to read. The following analysis acknowledges Chandler's creativity in developing his main character, Philip Marlowe, with his usage of simile. However, the excessive style of the novel creates a dominating force that ultimately leaves the reader unfulfilled at the end.
November 1998, written for FILM 220: Aspects of Criticism. This is a 24-week course for second-year students, examining methods of critical analysis, interpretation and evaluation. The final assignment was simply to write a 1000-word critical essay on a film seen in class during the final six-weeks of the course. Students were expected to draw on concepts they had studied over the length of the course.
Chris McCandless- a name immortalized due to his inexplicable desire to escape the civilized life for one in the wild. This desire inadvertently led to Chris McCandless’ death by starvation. Chris was an arrogant young man who believed he could do nearly anything. Little did he know that this excessive self-confidence would lead to his demise. Many readers still care about Chris McCandless and yearn for the answer to Chris’ death. Some adore Chris and try to emulate him. Others are adverse to these views and condemn Chris’ choices hoping others will not follow his self-destructive path.
The right side is almost purely white, with blue and gray shadows; the rest of the body is black, dark brown, and navy. The profile of a white woman obscures the left half of the black face, facing to the right of the piece; her hair is in a large braid and she wears a simple pearl earring. The black woman has long, flowing, bright blue hair, as well as full red lips. The black woman’s body has a rose over it, and the white woman is wearing what looks like a straw bikini; the figure is wrapped in a thick rope from the waist down. The stark contrast between the white and black meet with a definitive line; there is no blending between the two colors, which amplifies the feelings of separation and difference between the two halves of the woman’s
Winston Churchill is misattributed with the proverb “History is written by the victors” this is easily seen within most history classes of the U.S. The lessons that are reiterated to the youth of the country remain carefully ethnocentric to preserve the image of America the Great. Beginning in grade school “American” students are taught to celebrate the moments of Anglo colonialism viewing them as glorious events in the building of the country, although they are mostly devoid of any mention of the marginalized groups of people whose back the country was built upon it is continued to be called the Melting Pot. While history textbooks will go on to tell the tales of Stephen F. Austin and Davey Crockett the achievements
Hawks' version of The Big Sleep is known to be one of the best examples of the film genre-film noir. "Film noir (literally 'black film,' from French critics who noticed how dark and black the looks and themes were of these films) is a style of American films which evolved in the 1940s." (The Internet Movie Database LTD). Film noir typically contains melancholy, and not so moral themes. Another characteristic of film noir is just because the main character has the title hero, that does not mean that he will always be alive at the end of the book, or that the hero is always "good." Marlowe in The Big Sleep is a prime example of this concept. In the novel it is questionable how lawfully moral he actually is, concerning the situation of turning Carmen into the police for killing Sean Regan. This aspect of Marlowe's character added yet another difficult task of formatting The Big Sleep to the big screen-the question of how the audience (media) might react to such a personality trait was now placed before the writing staff (IE production codes).
The differences between the characters in Hawks' adaptation of Chandler's The Big Sleep and the novel are obvious to someone who has noticed the details on both. Of course there are positive and negative aspects to such choices which Hawks makes in his film and those decisions which Hawks made from novel to movie should be examined and questioned whether they helped or hindered the production of The Big Sleep. One of the major differences, and I would argue a drawback, in the film version is the representation of the characters and the predictable ending. Looking specifically at Marlowe and Mrs. Regan, it is easy to see that Hawks changed some things about their characters simply because of the high profile actors: Bogart and Bacall. Such a change in the characters was most likely a decision made by Hawks in order to make the novel more believable or exciting to the audience, perhaps assuming the majority of the viewers may not have read the novel. The end of the movie was completely predictable and I think Hawks took the easy way out when making his decision to end with Marlowe and Regan ending up in love. The changes Hawks made in the characters as well as the end are ones that I assume Hawks made on the basis of what he thought would produce the best film. I can respect Hawks' goal, but I think anyone who has read the novel would agree that the novel is the better version between the two.
Some of the views on the death of Chris McCandless are harsh and some people call him insane or psychotic, while others think the exact opposite and think that Chris just might be a legend. “When you consider McCandless from my perspective, you quickly see that what he did wasn’t even particularly daring, just stupid, tragic and inconsiderate” (Christian). Considering that Chris was ill prepared, Peter Christian thinks that what Chris did wasn’t the smartest thing to do and this is why he thinks Chris’s choice to venture into the Alaskan wilderness was dumb. In addition, Craig Medred also happens to think Chris might have been insane. “Almost every p...
The noir style is showcased in Sunset Boulevard with its use of visually dark and uncomfortable settings and camera work, as well as its use of the traditional film noir characters. In addition, the overall tone and themes expressed in it tightly correspond to what many film noirs addressed. What made this film unique was its harsh criticism of the film industry itself, which some of Wilder’s peers saw as biting the hand that fed him. There is frequent commentary on the superficial state of Hollywood and its indifference to suffering, which is still a topic avoided by many in the film business today. However, Sunset Blvd. set a precedent for future film noirs, and is an inspiration for those who do not quite believe what they are being shown by Hollywood.
All in all, it is interesting how the trials of life can lead a person into an awakening that inspires millions. Many people believe that walking “into the wild” to live off the land and find himself alone in nature was arrogant, foolish and irresponsible. Chris lacks of knowledge about the wild was a major factor in his death. Chris did not plan how he will survive in the wilderness without proper equipments. He misunderstood that he would have no problem in setting in the wild. Chris immature manner and decisions lead him to starvation and ultimately death. If he planned it out in the beginning he would have saved his life.