It’s a pairing that, on paper, seems too good to be true:

Robert Altman and Raymond Chandler.

Part of me can't believe it took us this long to mention either of them on the site, so I figured featuring The Long Goodbye as this week’s Friday Night Flick would be a good way to kill two birds with one stone.

If there were ever any director fit to translate Chandler’s The Long Goodbye to the big screen - which also entailed being trusted with bringing his oft-recurring private investigator lead, the fan favorite Philip Marlowe, to life - it was certainly Altman. Those of you who’ve seen Altman’s most celebrated film, Nashville, know that watching one of his flicks can be a little bit like reading from a Madlibs sheet: the manifold plot twists, the constant introduction of new characters and storylines, the whole subplots within subplots thing etc… but he always sticks the landing. Kinda like a Raymond Chandler novel.

Google’s synopsis of the film leaves a bit to be desired, so here’s mine:

P.I. Philip Marlowe goes out to get a can of cat food late one night in Malibu and returns to find his old pal Terry Lennox in his apartment, who asks him for a ride to Tijuana, no questions asked. Marlowe obliges. He wakes the next day to the news that Lennox killed his wife the night prior in Malibu, and later himself in Mexico, but Marlowe thinks there’s more at play and decides to further investigate the matter himself. Later, both the sheriff and a local gangster named Marty Augustine quickly come knocking, the latter of which tasks Marlowe with reimbursing a $500,000 payment owed to him by Lennox, which is where the plot really gets its legs.

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In terms of storytelling ability, the bandwagon is quick to place the giants of ‘70s cinema like Coppola or Kubrick or Scorcese atop the proverbial heap. And sure, far-flung stories about mafiosos and deranged taxi drivers and dystopian gang violence are fun (and these films are all undoubtedly masterpieces), but when it comes to actual, realistic, human drama, all roads lead to Altman. He’s the king in that regard. Add Raymond Chandler to the mix and the end result is nothing short of a masterpiece. —Jackson Todd