In 1939, the famous private investigator Philip Marlowe is hired by a wealthy heiress, Clare Cavendish, to find her lover Nico Peterson, who has disappeared in the fog. During his investigations he will discover the dark side of Hollywood.
Posted on February 17th
Liam Neeson may be 70 years old, but he hasn’t finished playing the hero, even for his 100th film! The talented Irish actor, not forgotten in Schindler’s List, Gangs of New York or Chris Nolan’s Batman trilogy, brilliantly portrays private investigator Philip Marlowe in a film noir adaptation of John Banville’s novel The Blacked-Eye Blonde.
Marlowe opens in the small office of detective Philip Marlowe in the presence of the seductive Clare Cavendish (excellent Diane Kruger), an extremely wealthy heiress who wants to find her lover Nico Peterson (François Arnaud, who director Neil Jordan had directed in the series The Borgias) .
Shortly after his research began, Peterson was pronounced dead. A murder that would have been committed outside of The Cabana private club. But Marlowe’s investigation has only just begun. Was the body found really Nico’s? The famous detective (whom Humphrey Bogart played in the 1946 film The Big Sleep) pokes his nose into the Cavendish story and goes up the thread.
Marlowe takes several interesting detours towards his breakup, deftly blending this family drama with a plot about the Mexican underworld and the seedy workings of a Hollywood film studio. Anything with a touch of humor, which is welcome.
Aside from Liam Neeson even getting involved in a couple of fights — right down to sighing a tasty “I’m getting too old for this” at the end of a fight — all the fringe roles are worth noting. From Dorothy Cavendish, Clare’s mother (Jessica Lange), to the manager of the Cabana club, Floyd Hanson (Danny Huston), past the criminal Lou Hendricks (Alan Cumming), without forgetting his driver (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje).
As the character played by Quebec actor François Arnaud (Nico Peterson) is in high demand, he is not very present… But we see him in several silent scenes, and he plays (very well) in at least two striking scenes.
In fact, Marlowe, camping in Los Angeles in 1939, reminds us a little of the atmosphere of the film The Untouchables (by Brian de Palma), which took place in the same years, those of Prohibition, when Al Capone was rain or shine .
We find that same spirit of liberty where everything was permitted—embodied in the villains—that even the law and orderers could not stamp out. Marlowe recreates that spirit with gorgeous photography (most of the film was shot in Spain) and that dusty grain that depicts those epic battles between good and evil that rarely end well.
indoors
Film Noir, detective
Marlowe
Neil Jordan
Starring Liam Neeson, Diane Kruger, Jessica Lange, Alan Cumming
1h 50