But the fact of the matter is that here’s Neeson, 70, reteamed with his “Michael Collins” director Neil Jordan, to play the title role in “Marlowe,” adapted not from a Chandler book but one by John Banville, sanctioned by Chandler’s estate. Set in Bay City, L.A., in 1939, the movie opens with a shot of palm trees against the sun before giving us a glimpse of Marlowe conjuring himself out of bed.
The cutting of a sprightly figure notwithstanding, Marlowe was never a character who was light or meant to be taken lightly. Marlowe does not have joie de vivre. Chandler conceived the detective as a sort of modern-day knight. Behind his ironical observations and biting one-liners, there was a sense not only of purpose but of duty. The old song says a man’s got to be true to his code. Chandler’s Marlowe was; so are Jordan and Neeson. But where other Marlowes in cinema got let off with mere world-weariness, here Neeson sometimes acts as if he’s just been run down by a steamroller.
That’s not a complaint, or rather, it doesn’t have to be. In choosing not to make it one—in other words, by allowing Neeson and Jordan to have their heads—I was able to get a reasonable amount of enjoyment out of this film.
The plot is not of the near-Gordian-knot variety that characterized Chandler’s books. It’s a bit more like, well, “Chinatown,” and the presence of Danny Huston as a transparent—and white-suited!—villain underscores that. Marlowe is approached by Diane Kruger’s Clare Cavendish, a married woman who’s a trifle peeved by the disappearance of her young, movie-industry-affiliated boyfriend. It turns out the guy faked his death; turns out that Clare suspected that but didn’t tell Marlowe when she hired her. Turns out, too, that Clare’s got a dowager-ish mom (Jessica Lange) with an intense interest in her daughter’s personal life and in the life of an ostensible “ambassador” who is himself involved in the lifeblood of a (fictional) film studio.
Add to that Huston’s sleazy nightclub owner, a frightened sister-of-the-not-actually-deceased, an aging starlet with some dope on the not-actually-deceased, a couple of cop friends of Marlowe’s, a side order of corrupt bigwig played by Alan Cumming, and a savvier-than-expected chauffeur (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje), and you’ve got more than sufficient components for a percolating plot.
Thing is, “Marlowe” doesn’t do much percolating. William Monahan and Neil Jordan’s script keeps a near-elegiac pace and tone (bolstered and sometimes mildly overthrown by David Holmes’ multi-varied score) as they pepper the dialogue with allusions to Christopher Marlowe, James Joyce, William Strunk, Jr., and Greek myth. He imbues all his characters with a self-consciousness, an awareness that they’re players in a pool of rot, a place some want to wallow in and others want to get out of at least a little clean. Early on, Kruger’s character says to Neeson, “You’re a very perceptive and sensitive man, Mr. Marlowe. I imagine it gets you into trouble.” The remainder of the film is an elaboration of that declaration.