No thread for Raymond Chandler?! (s/d, c/d, discuss, whatever)

Never read him until this week for the stupid reason that I already knew Marlowe from the movies. Started with The Big Sleep, which is a helluva lot nastier than I remember it being on film; the gay bashing is startling but...understandable, I guess, given the milieu. Marlowe himself is quite the sadist, too.

Where to go next? There are far fewer novels than I would have expected.

All his novels are worth your time. Playback isn't quite as good as the others but the other five are all terrific. It doesn't make any real difference but you might as well read them consecutively with Farewell My Lovely next.

Get the novels out the way before starting the short stories, though, as he reused plots frequently and there are spoilers.

i liked playback

I liked Playback too. Reading consecutively is the way to go.

saw murder, my sweet last night. dug drugged panicky Marlowe.

love that he lives at same place as in altmans

dream/knockout/doped sequences v cool

lol at the wikipedia rundown clearly not having comprehended at least half of the plot

"Farewell My Lovely" (1975 w Robert Mitchum) is a pretty good adaptation of the same book too

Mike Mazurki was the perfect Moose.

John Wayne was a big Chandler reader.

Marlowe in the novels is a tough guy, not physically a Dick Powell type, but Powell gets the sarcasm across better than Bogart did.

got vol 2 of his Library of America anthology -- read his essay on screenwriting in Hollywood, which is crisp and just weary enough.

oh, huh. what else is in there other than the obvious?

some letters

also an essay on mystery writing

And the screenplay to Double Indemnity, et al.

https://slate.com/culture/2018/07/raymond-chandler-in-the-age-of-metoo.html?wpsrc=sh_all_dt_tw_ru

oo, megan abbott!

i think i heard about megan abbott via some ILX thread, and I've really enjoyed her stuff so far!
i just randomly watched the late 70s remake of the Big Sleep starring Mitchum (and a Jimmy Stewart cameo!) — thought at the very least I'd be getting some good late 70s Los Angeles vibes, but it was set (for no apparent reason) in London. Weird. Wouldn't say it was a lost classic by any means, but Mitchum is definitely a pleasure.

The Mitchum Big Sleep was financed by Lew Grade's British production company ITC, and directed by Englishman Michael Winner, so I'm guessing the relocation to London was mainly for budgetary reasons.

never read a good word about that one

really odd how three years before Mitchum played Marlowe in the 1941-set Farewell My Lovely (which is very good iirc) and then hops in a time machine and a plane to tackle a case in London.

i saw The Big Sleep a long time ago, caught some of it on TV. It seemed extremely inessential, to say the least. Mitchum at least was comfortably solid in the role. Better in FML.

it's funny, because they even try to retcon marlowe into London — he says he's been there since "the war" or something.

I think Basil Rathbone's Sherlock Holmes also wound up in the middle of WWII in his film series

He was battling Nazis in at least one film, England recruited everyone in their darkest hour.

His Encore