Cathardincu Surprisingly incoherent and boring

Marketic It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

ChanBot i must have seen a different film!!

Calum Hutton It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

Hitchcoc Someone seeing this might think it's clichéd. But this is representative of the underpinnings of clichés. This is true Noir with the wisecracking detective, played by Dick Powell, the girl, pure of heart, in trouble, and the blond who is like a powder keg. Throw in police who hate private detectives and you've got it all. The plot is quite complex but the lines are outrageous and clever, the ever nonplussed Marlowe delivering most of them. The object is a jade necklace worth a hundred thousand (probably a million in today's valuation). This is enough to get people killed and betrayed. It moves along nicely and has all those wonderful moments. It's too bad Raymond Chandler didn't write more books that were adapted for Hollywood.

poe426 In terms of craftsmanship, it's hard to beat MURDER, MY SWEET: it's tight in every respect, from beginning to end. It also boasts some truly outstanding cinematography, with some of the most unique shots you're ever likely to see: Dick Powell as Marlowe, sitting at his desk, looking at his own reflection in the window, while behind him appears the man-mountain, Mike Mazurki. It's effectively a three-shot, with two clearly visible faces and the back of Powell's head. Mazurki is one of the most intimidating presences to ever lurk nearby in a film noir: he literally hauls Powell off his feet as he tries to convince him to help him keep tabs on a crooked dame. It's like a big kid, unaware of his own strength, manhandling a smaller kid. Powell's narration is priceless: "A black pool opened up under my feet. I dove in." That's Raymond Chandler, of course, but the line (delivered at least twice in the movie, if memory serves) is delivered perfectly, almost matter-of-factly, by Powell. One of the great films noir. (There's also a memorable sequence wherein Marlowe is kidnapped and force-fed drugs; his torment makes what Ray Milland goes through in THE LOST WEEKEND look like a walk in the park. This idea would be used decades later in THE FRENCH CONNECTION II, but II isn't quite as good as MURDER, MY SWEET.)

PWNYCNY This is a good movie but it's dated. This is the kind of my that has turned into an antique, meaning that when it was new it was a gem but with the passage of time it has lost its luster. Now, that does not mean that the movie is not worth watching. It has a wonderful cast and excellent cinematography, but still, the movie is essentially dull and hokey. This has nothing to do with the actors. Rather, it a question of changing tastes. What passed for an exciting crime drama in the 1940s would seem stodgy today. Maybe one should not make such generalizations, but to remake this movie today would require a massive re-write to bring it in conformity with the tastes of today's audience, and unless someone today is willing to accept this movie on its own 1940s terms, it will not excite; rather it will bore, and maybe even cure you of insomnia.

Dave from Ottawa Everybody lied. The first time private eye Philip Marlowe encountered somebody, good or bad, he/she was always lying. The only differences were whether the liars were protecting themselves or other people. Marlowe had the full time job of disentangling the deceptions, and finding the truth behind and within all the scheming."She was a charming middle aged lady with a face like a bucket of mud. I gave her a drink."Screenwriter John Paxton retention of Chandler's deathless first person prose in a series of voice-overs is only one of the things this movie does right to capture the authentic feel of the hard boiled crime novel. The novel itself is complex, almost too complex, but Paxton did a fine job of stripping down the story to a 99 min. running time without actually dumbing anything down. The characters remain tricky in their schemes and manipulative in their approach to each other. When everything comes revealed, the viewer is not left musing over loose plot threads.The dark shadowy world of its private eye hero is visualized nicely: visible (single) source lighting, night sequences, pools of light under street lamps, people turning switches on and off. Light becomes this awkward enemy force, as if humans are allergic to it, like cockroaches. This is the essence of film noir, and cinematographer Harry J. Wild did imaginative, professional work here. In camera effects, designed to bring out less pleasant aspects of Marlowe's world - getting sapped, beaten, drugged etc. - only serve to enhance the appeal of this.This is the sort of movie that was done well at one time, but is something of a lost art. It's a great way to spend an afternoon, kicking it old school. Enjoy.