Private detective Philip Marlowe (Elliott Gould) tries to help a friend who is accused of murdering his wife. Meanwhile, he takes a new case from a beautiful blond, Eileen Wade (Nina van Pallandt), who coincidentally has a past with his friend.
[Altman] attempts the impossible and pulls it off.
San Francisco Examiner
January 11, 2009
Robert Altman's labyrinthine take on the Raymond Chandler classic is noir unburdened by a straight narrative - it's a triumph of atmosphere and attitude, a swiftly unfolding whodunit punctuated by subversive absurdities and shattering acts of violence.
Robert Altman made a bold statement in his casting of Elliott Gould as a Jewish version of Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe character in this modestly budgeted film.
... one of those movies that always flits through my mind when someone asks me to name my favorite movies of all time. I usually don't mention it, but it's always there, on the periphery. It's at least one of my two or three favorite Altmans.
The Stranger (Seattle, WA)
July 11, 2007
Everywhere you look, there's something delightfully weird going on ... Altman and company fashion a state of slouching, freeform Zen that no one else has ever really duplicated.
Raymond Chandler's sentimental foolishness is the taking-off place for Robert Altman's heady, whirling sideshow of a movie, set in the early-seventies L.A. of the stoned sensibility.
