Elliott Gould stars as Raymond Chandler’s tough detective Philip Marlowe, a private eye investigating his friend’s apparent murder while simultaneously taking on the case of her missing husband, only for the two cases to collide in a way that suggests everyone around him knows a lot more than he’s letting on. The film revels in its convolution, demanding the utmost attention and rewarding it generously, crafting a mystery within a mystery that reveals everything that makes Marlowe one of fiction’s greatest detectives. It’s a slower-paced film that didn’t have the benefit of a rising action star to bring it into the cultural conversation, and it’s slipped into relative obscurity every generation since.
