70
Metascore
9 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com
- 100Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertChicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertFarewell, My Lovely is a great entertainment and a celebration of Robert Mitchum's absolute originality.
- Elegant neo-noir with a perfectly cast Robert Mitchum, at 58 the oldest actor to play Marlowe.
- 75TV Guide MagazineTV Guide MagazineAn affectionate adaptation of Raymond Chandler's novel that beautifully evokes the seamy side of 1940s Los Angeles via superb production design and the same period atmosphere cinematographer Alonzo previously evoked for Chinatown.
- 70Time OutTime OutThe film's triumph is Mitchum's definitive Marlowe, which captures perfectly the character's down-at-heel integrity and erratic emotional involvement with his cases.
- It's as if someone had put pillow springs, power-steering and a tape deck into a classic racing-car. It is still handsome and it still goes, but it is a handsome mediocrity.
- 60Village VoiceVillage VoiceBy simply rack-focusing Mitchum in an occasional close-up, Richards evokes an entire biography, a sense of weariness and reflection. [25 Aug 1975, p.66]
- 50NewsweekNewsweekPerversely, it is a reverence for langauge - the most exciting aspect of Chandler's novels - that does the movie in. With a face like an old catcher's mitt, a beat-up bulk anesthetized by booze, Mitchum as Marlowe doesn't have to tell us a thing about himself. But tell us he does - in gumshoe-ese that echoes Chandler's language without its hallucinatory sparkle. [18 Aug 1975, p.73]
- 50Farewell, My Lovely is a lethargic, vaguely campy tribute to Hollywood's private eye mellers of the 1940s and to writer Raymond Chandler, whose Phillip Marlowe character has inspired a number of features. Despite an impressive production and some firstrate performances, this third version fails to generate much suspense or excitement.