“You know, I think you’re nuts. You go barging around without a very clear idea of what you’re doing. Everybody bats you down, smacks you over the head, fills you full of stuff…and you keep right on hitting between tackle and end. I don’t think you even know which side you’re on.“Edward Dmytryk gave us a film that has often been credited with helping to define the film-noir style of the 1940s. It makes perfect sense since his film brims with many of the major hallmarks of the genre. The powder-burned Marlowe’s initial narration carried through a flashback lends a wry and cynical commentary to the entire story. The screen itself is cloaked in shadows, filled with billows of cigarette smoke, and is often superimposed with disorienting images. Early on one man named Marriot is dead, Marlowe gets clocked over the head, roughed up several times, not to mention drugged up. He gets hired, used, thrown off, and seduced more than once. All because of an expensive jade necklace. As Anne notes, Marlowe goes charging into his case not quite knowing what is going on or who he is dealing with. That ambiguity is one of the strengths of this film because we are never allowed the comfort of knowing who to side with.

“You know, I think you’re nuts. You go barging around without a very clear idea of what you’re doing. Everybody bats you down, smacks you over the head, fills you full of stuff…and you keep right on hitting between tackle and end. I don’t think you even know which side you’re on.“Edward Dmytryk gave us a film that has often been credited with helping to define the film-noir style of the 1940s. It makes perfect sense since his film brims with many of the major hallmarks of the genre. The powder-burned Marlowe’s initial narration carried through a flashback lends a wry and cynical commentary to the entire story. The screen itself is cloaked in shadows, filled with billows of cigarette smoke, and is often superimposed with disorienting images. Early on one man named Marriot is dead, Marlowe gets clocked over the head, roughed up several times, not to mention drugged up. He gets hired, used, thrown off, and seduced more than once. All because of an expensive jade necklace. As Anne notes, Marlowe goes charging into his case not quite knowing what is going on or who he is dealing with. That ambiguity is one of the strengths of this film because we are never allowed the comfort of knowing who to side with.