The Long Goodbye

Jan 4, 2025 5:33 PM

Author:Raymond Chandler,Toby Stephens,Full Cast

The Long Goodbye

Fast-talking, trouble-seeking private eye Philip Marlowe is a different kind of detective: a moral man in an amoral world. California in the ’40s and ’50s is as beautiful as a ripe fruit and rotten to the core, and Marlowe must struggle to retain his integrity amidst the corruption he encounters daily. In The Long Goodbye, Marlowe forms an uneasy friendship with a drunk named Terry Lennox. So when Lennox shows up late one night, looking guilty and asking for a ride to Tijuana airport, Marlowe agrees - though he suspects he’s going to regret it. He’s right. First Lennox’s rich, adulterous wife is found murdered, then Marlowe is arrested, then Lennox himself turns up dead in Mexico: an apparent suicide with a signed confession by his side. And if that wasn’t enough, Marlowe also finds himself babysitting an author to make sure he delivers his next book. Trying to juggle two increasingly tricky cases, Marlowe knows that if he takes his eye off the ball, he could end up dead... Starring Toby Stephens, this powerful dramatisation by Stephen Wyatt cannot fail to draw you into Raymond Chandler’s darkly attractive world of deceit, decadence and death.

Reviews

Very angry and very funny

—— Empire

Kermode has nutsy-boltsy knowledge, fierce and idiosyncratic enthusiasms ... and some very interesting things to say

—— Guardian

As impressive as it is entertaining ... Takes a wrecking ball to the studio chicanery

—— Word

Expertly written, funny and fascinating

—— Shortlist

Frankly alarming

—— Metro

Catching Mark Kermode in full rant is like witnessing an irate bloke slagging off an unfaithful mistress. Only funnier ... Disagreeing with Kermode is just as much fun as agreeing with him

—— Daily Telegraph

A spectacularly well-researched and vehement argument

—— Sunday Times

Combines historical context with hilariously barbed anecdotes

—— Total Film

The angrier Mark Kermode gets, the funnier he is; good news then that this book is FURIOUS

—— Empire

[A] laugh-out-loud account that will tickle the funny bone of any film fanatic

—— Star

Witty and incisive

—— Choice

Cutting and witty

—— Loaded

[Kermode] clearly has a profound love of film and the depth of knowledge to go with it

—— Jeff Dawson , Sunday Times

An angry blast about the state of cinema-going

—— Christopher Fowler, Books of the Year: Cinema , Independent

Kermode sits in the stalls peeking through his fingers at what we’re served up on the silver screen and motormouthing about bad cinema in a frank and funny counterblast to all the Hollywood hype

—— Saga

The Good, the Bad and the Multiplex is the film critic’s anguished cri de coeur against overpriced 3D film tickets and soulless cinemas ... often very funny and enlivened with wonderful digressions borne out of a lifetime’s movie-going

—— Books of the Year , Metro

Difficult to ignore

—— Good Book Guide

a spritely, spirited tome ... with welcome doses of spicy self-deprecation and fascinating cultural history.

—— The Big Issue in the North

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