再见吾爱 Farewell, My Lovely(1975)
演员：
影评：
根据美国侦探小说大师雷蒙德·钱德勒小说改编的同名电影《再见吾爱》（1975年），由迪克·理查兹执导。影片沉缓的节奏，如同时而悠扬时而沉闷的爵士乐，和缓的展开着。这与已年老体衰的罗伯特·米彻姆的表演一脉相承。
想起当年活力四射的他出演《荒岛仙窟日月情》跟美人儿黛博拉·寇儿的对手戏，是多么的让人血脉偾张，亦如《再见，吾爱》中出演打手的年轻史泰龙。1976年史泰龙便执导并主演了轰动影坛的《洛奇》。要知道，这位硬汉最喜欢的演员就是罗伯特·米彻姆。其对史泰龙的影响显而易见。
看老年的罗伯特·米彻姆电影，除了感慨时光无情之外，更多的则是看出他愈老愈有劲头，浑身是胆，且充满由内向外散发的老而弥坚的老戏骨魅力。而已声名鹊起的夏洛特·兰普林在片中的惊艳出演，虽是迟来者，却让人领略到《夜间守门人》之外的不同表演路径。
这几十年，俨然已成老戏骨的夏洛特·兰普林所出演的多为法国片或欧洲片，极少出演英美片，这恐也是她的决然选择和生活态度。越老越有风情越有韵味，单那双迷死人的眼睛就会演绎动人的故事，她的眼睛真的会说话。凡有她所出演的片子，我都会欣然接受，如同喜欢克里斯廷·托马斯·斯科特的电影一样。
《再见吾爱》并没有那么复杂的剧情。老侦探马洛跟洛杉矶警方一直保有若隐若现的关系，甚至在吵嚷的外表下合作得还极融洽。毕竟他只是个私人侦探，他所接受的业务多为无头案，可谓来无影去无踪的人物，否则别人也就不会花钱雇他。长得如同推土机的壮汉穆斯·马洛伊，刚坐了七年牢出来。
当年，他因为抢劫了银行八万美金而入狱。与他一同参与抢劫的情人维尔玛则拿了这八万美金后就不知所踪，也没有给他写过一封信，杳如黄鹤，这无疑让马洛伊深陷痛苦之中。这位四肢发达头脑简单的壮汉，并非为了钱才找她，只因为他一直爱着这位漂亮的维尔玛。
马洛接了这单后，就摊上了大事似的，经常会遇到向他扫射的杀手。不但要冒着被杀的风险，且找这位维尔玛着实困难重重，好不容易在精神病院找到，马洛伊拿着照片却说不是。马洛只得冒着枪林弹雨的继续找。跟他接头的人无论是男人女人大都难逃一死的命运。自认识了老法官的年轻美貌妻子后，他就好像交上了桃花运。原来这只是个局。
实质上，这位艳丽的法官之妻就是维尔玛。当马洛带着马洛伊找到了真正的维尔玛之后，激动的马洛伊竟然吃了维尔玛的一颗子弹。马洛伊喃喃的看着她“为什么？”。当然，维尔玛也吃了马洛的一颗子弹。这让马洛极为不忍。可这也是没法子的事，谁叫她举枪要射杀他呢。
一腔热血唯满溢着爱，却被理想化的爱人给射杀，这真是绝妙的讽刺。时间是如此的奇妙和不可预测。从妓女院出来的维尔玛摇身一变成了名流之妻。在资本主义社会，能挤进上流社会并不容易，就如同当年失去土地的富农却一心想挤进贫下中农队伍一样。维尔玛当然要千方百计的保护自己免受风险。如同日本电影《人证》里的日本妈妈，她没法接受一个突然从美国而来的黑人孩子。尽管这黑人儿子的确是她当年所生，但时空变幻之后不容她再坦然接纳。
爱，一旦打上阶级的烙印，就无以挽回。这是头脑发热又简单愚蠢的马洛伊所不知晓的。最终他只是个冤死鬼而已，或者说这对曾经的情人都共赴黄泉，也算是殊途同归，至少不用再心生怨恨。而老迈的马洛再也不用跟警方絮叨这一案的前因后果了。
一切都结束了。再见，吾爱。
2013、11、12
Two screen adaptations of Raymond Chandler’s private eye Philip Marlowe novels, Robert Altman’s THE LONG GOODBYE stars a cool-as-a-cucumber Elliott Gould as our hero, with its milieu transposed from the 50s’ noir soil to a hippies-inflected 70s’ hedonism. Two years later, Dick Richards’s FAREWELL, MY LOVELY cherrypicks another cool-guy Robert Mitchum to play the gumshoe, the catch is that Mitchum was almost twice the age of Marlowe in the novel, set in 1941, his Marlowe looks already over the hill and laments over his jadedness about his line of business. Incidentally, both film feature a future action-picture kingpin, Schwarzenegger in the former, and Stallone in the latter.
THE LONG GOODBYE opens with Marlowe waking up in the wee hours and failing to procure the proper food for his pet cat (featuring one of the most finicky feline performances ever), the futility of his actions is loud and clear, which can be reflected upon his later attempt to clear the name of his late friend Terry Lennox (baseball pro player Bouton), who leaves a written confession of murdering his wife before killing himself. Marlowe doesn’t believe Lennox is the type who is capable of committing such grisly barbarity. Can he be wrong?
In FAREWELL, MY LOVELY, Marlowe is spotted by bank robber Moose Malloy (former boxer O'Halloran in his celluloid debut), who is freshly out of the joint and eager to find his old girlfriend Velma, so he hires Marlowe. Not deterred by the fact that someone obviously wants to rub out Malloy (hiding from bullets on the street when they first meet), Marlowe tracks down the breadcrumb trail with enough phlegm, even when he is abducted and drugged by the notorious madam Frances Amthor (a formidable Murtagh), a trippy paroxysm of hallucinations displays Richards and DP John A. Alonzo’s prestidigitation.
Sultry women tickle Marlowe’s interest, in both cases, but with a difference. Gould’s Marlowe is intrigued by Eileen Wade (van Pallandt, a swarthy beaut), wife of Roger Wade (Hayden), a bibulous novelist of note, who may not be above physical violence when he is plastered, but remains supernally chaste; whereas Mitchum’s Marlowe shares a blatant kiss with Helen (Rampling, pulling off a striking Bacall impression), the drop-dead gorgeous trophy wife of Judge Grayle (famed hardboiled crime fiction novelist Jim Thompson in a cameo role), right under the later’s disapproving eyes, and he has no misgivings of conducting an assignation with a potential femme fatale. A roué with an upright backbone, that is Marlowe in FAREWELL, MY LOVELY.
However, it is Gould’s Marlowe who registers a more magnetic allure, bandying about his pet phrase “It’s ok with me” whenever he is flummoxed, he is very much detached from the world around him, a loner with only a cat for company (who runs away after the prologue), he is the embodiment of existential fatalism, not blinking an eye even when he faces imminent danger (director Mark Rydell rises to the occasion as a bone-chilling gangster with a nasty streak). A chain-smoking Gould exemplifies the ultimate “coolness” of his era, which makes the final reveal and that blasting gunshot immeasurably satisfying, poetic justice prevails in a callous, immoral world. Next to which, the final reveal in FAREWELL, MY LOVELY has less surprising impact and that death-dealing gunshot is more knee-jerking than cathartic.
Overall, in Chandler’s creation, crime, alcoholism and homicide permeate L.A.’s underbelly. Marlowe’s comfort zone is still a homosocial one, attraction from the opposite sex always leads him up the garden path, and most importantly, private investigator is not a vocation to get minted. Female characters are rarely innocent bimbos, often they are culprits or damaged goods (Miles is bodacious as Jessie Florian, a woman dying for a shot glass of hooch, a second Oscar nomination proves MIDNIGHT COWBOYS isn’t a flash in the pan), a misogynistic slant cannot be overlooked.
In the mass, THE LONG GOODBYE informs something more innately perverse and engrossingly sleazy on the strength of Altman’s trenchant execution and sharp judgment of signs of the times, which humbles FAREWELL, MY LOVELY into a more run-of-the-mill neo-noir fable attacking come-hither gold-digger without pointing out the elephant in the room, why a doddering man like Judge Grayle wants to marry a wicked minx like Helen in the first place? The answer is plain as day.
referential entries: Altman’s 3 WOMEN (1977, 8.2/10); Robert Benton’s THE LATE SHOW (1977, 6.8/10); George Marshall’s THE BLUE DAHLIA (1946, 6.7/10); Howard Hawks’s THE BIG SLEEP (1946, 8.4/10).
Title: The Long Goodbye
Year: 1973
Genre: Crime, Drama
Country: USA
Language: English
Director: Robert Altman
Screenwriter: Leigh Brackett
Based on the novel by Raymond Chandler
Music: John Williams
Cinematography: Vilmos Zsigmond
Editor: Lou Lombardo
Cast:
Elliott Gould
Nina van Pallandt
Sterling Hayden
Mark Rydell
Henry Gibson
Jim Bouton
David Arkin
Jo Ann Brody
Stephen Coit
Warren Berlinger
Jack Knight
Pancho Córdova
Jerry Jones
John Davies
David Carradine
Arnold Schwarzenegger
Rating: 7.8/10
Title: Farewell, My Lovely
Year: 1975
Genre: Crime, Mystery, Thriller
Country: USA
Language: English
Director: Dick Richards
Screenwriter: David Zelag Goodman
Based on the novel by Raymond Chandler
Music: David Shire
Cinematography: John A. Alonzo
Editors: Joel Cox, Walter Thompson
Cast:
Robert Mitchum
Charlotte Rampling
John Ireland
Sylvia Miles
Jack O’Halloran
Anthony Zerbe
Harry Dean Stanton
John O’Leary
Kate Murtagh
Jimmie Archer
Walter McGinn
Sylvester Stallone
Joe Spinell
Logan Ramsey
Jim Thompson
Rainbeaux Smith
Rating: 6.9/10