The Long Goodbye

The Long Goodbye. 1973 United Artists, owned and distributed to DVD by MGM.
Starring: Elliott Gould, Nina Van Pallandt, Sterling Hayden, Mark Rydell, Henry Gibson, David Arkin, Jim Bouton, Arnold Schwarzenegger
Director: Robert Altman
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Robert Altman directed this film adaptation of Raymond Chandler's 1953 novel of the same name. The screenplay is considerably different than the original source, including a drastic character departure for one major player.

Elliott Gould is detective Philip Marlowe, who opens the movie by dealing with his fussy and hungry cat (the future Morris, we kid you not) at three in the morning. The cat threatened early to steal the show, lemme tell ya. After feeding the cat, Terry Lennox (Bouton), Marlowe's best friend, drops in and asks for a lift from Los Angeles to Tijuana right that very second, and the detective obliges. After getting home, Marlowe is met by two other detectives, who are accusing Terry of murdering his rich wife Sylvia. Marlowe can't believe his best friend could be a murderer, so he refuses to answer the detectives' questions, which earns him three days in jail. He is released after it's reported that Terry committed suicide in Mexico, which means an open-and-shut case to the cops and the media, but Marlowe is not convinced.

After getting out, Marlowe is hired by Eileen Wade (Pallandt), the wife of the alcoholic novelist Roger Wade (Hayden), who is having a creative dry spell, and has a Papa Hemingway persona that leads him on regular booze binges and lengthy disappearances. While investigating the missing Mr. Wade, Marlowe discovers that the Wades knew the Lennoxes socially, and there's much more to the deaths of the Lennoxes than what he knew before.

A great Altman film with a decent performance from Gould. One highlight was Bouton's performance; this was his only feature film role in between stints playing baseball and authoring books like Ball Four. Recommended movie.