Glimmerubro It is not deep, but it is fun to watch. It does have a bit more of an edge to it than other similar films.

Curapedi I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

Plustown A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

Humaira Grant It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

bkoganbing For The Falcon Takes Over the folks at RKO chose an impeccable source in the person of Raymond Chandler for this film. It's based on the famous Chandler novel Farewell My Lovely which both Dick Powell and Robert Mitchum played Philip Marlowe in two different versions.But in this first adaption the private eye is our protagonist the urbane and witty Falcon played by George Sanders. RKO didn't even bother to change the names of the rest of the characters, just grafted the Falcon series regulars in the story.Standing out in the cast is Ward Bond playing the hulking Moose Malloy fresh out of stir and looking for his Velma. Helen Gilbert is the selfsame Velma for whom the Moose did a prison stretch for and who thanks him for that solid favor properly. Lynn Bari plays a would be reporter who gets the scoop of her life when the Falcon breaks the case. And Anne Revere really stands out as the dipsomaniacal Jessie Florian.Having seen the two classic later versions first didn't spoil this one for me. It's a solid entry in the Falcon film series though it doesn't have the style and ambiance of the Powell and Mitchum versions.How could it?

utgard14 The third in RKO's Falcon series starring George Sanders is one of the best. It's notable for being the first adaptation of Raymond Chandler's novel "Farewell, My Lovely," with the Falcon character substituted for Philip Marlowe. The plot has a brute named Moose Malloy (Ward Bond) searching for his former girlfriend Velma. The Falcon tries to find her first. Sanders is great as usual. Ward Bond, who is best remember today for his supporting roles in many John Ford movies, is very good as Moose. He's clearly wearing a padded suit to make him look more imposing but it doesn't detract from his performance. The always enjoyable Allen Jenkins provides comic relief as the Falcon's sidekick Goldie. Pretty Lynn Bari is the reporter who, of course, falls for our charming hero. She and Sanders have nice chemistry, but Sanders generally had nice chemistry with all his female costars I think. The rest of the excellent cast includes Selmar Jackson, Helen Gilbert, Hans Conried, Anne Revere, Edward Gargan, and the wonderful James Gleason, one of my all-time favorite character actors. As an adaptation of Chandler's novel, it's not the best. "Murder, My Sweet" starring Dick Powell holds that distinction. But it's still fun, helped by a great cast, brisk pace, and short runtime.

blanche-2 George Sanders is again The Falcon in "The Falcon Takes Over," a 1942 entry into the series. This one is the plot of "Farewell, My Lovely," and Ward Bond as the nearly catatonic strongman Moose Malloy walking around in a fog looking for Velma.They've sort of stuffed The Falcon and Goldy into this plot, a complicated story that was tough to cram into 65 minutes. Consequently this isn't the breezy Falcon we're used to, and most of the comedy goes to Goldy, who is terrified of Malloy and sees him around every corner. James Gleason, as the Inspector O'Hara, investigating the murder of a night club manager, also had a funny bit he did several times with his underling.Hans Conreid has a serious role here as Marriot, and Turhan Bey has a small role as swami Jules Amthor.All in all, entertaining, maybe not the usual Falcon except for his flirting with every woman, but decent.

bmacv This entry in an otherwise it-is-what-it-is series of crime programmers merits attention because it preserves the first filming of a novel by Raymond Chandler: Farewell, My Lovely – two years before Edward Dmytryk's Murder, My Sweet, one of that handful of 1944 films that really got the noir cycle rolling.Often such adaptations bear scant resemblance to their original material, bringing to mind the screenplay Joe Gillis (in Sunset Blvd.) wrote that started out with Okies in the Dustbowl and ended up on a torpedo boat. But The Falcon Takes Over startlingly opens with a character called Moose Malloy (Ward Bond) looking for his Velma (Helen Gilbert can't even begin to pinch-hit for Claire Trevor). Along the way we visit that drunken old streel Jessie Florian (Anne Revere, every bit as good as Esther Howard) and Jules Amthor (Turhan Bey, complete with turban and crystal ball).Given the quality of much of the cast and the initial fidelity to Chandler's material, the movie promises to be much better than it turns out. And what sinks it is the notion that Chandler could supply fodder for a `programmer.' First of all, 90 or 100 minutes offer too brief a span for his baroque tales to unfurl; an hour plus change mutilates them irreparably. Second, franchises like Charlie Chan, or The Saint, or The Falcon are struck from the same template, to which all material must conform. So the setting is not the languorous corruption of Los Angeles but the hurly-burly of New York; missing as well is any sense of Chandler's awareness of the advantages conferred by wealth and class.But most conspicuous in his absence, of course, is Philip Marlowe. He disappears into George Sander's last run as The Falcon, before he bequeathed the franchise to his brother Tom Conway. (Sanders walks through this picture as if he had given up on the last one.) He has a sidekick, too (Allen Jenkins), who's chock-full of amusing malapropisms. Sidekicks and malapropisms are about as far from Chandler's dark universe as it's possible to go.