Joaquim da Silva Fontes, Significação e Estabilidade do Género no ...

Figure 4. The Big Sleep
the chaotic underworld of the novel through setting and visualisation rather than narrative
drive. Despite the complexities of narrative, the core of the film is in the world the story
depicts and the movements of Marlowe within it. Furthermore, the novel also presents a
skilful description of setting, as Chandler was very keen on describing vivid and squalid
locations. Marlowe’s untidy office is depicted as having “venerable magazines” and “net
curtains that needed laundering”, or the Fulwider building’s vacant offices, for example, as
“one gilt elevator” and “tarnished and well-missed spittoon on a gnawed rubber mat”.
In sharp contrast to these low places is the elegant Sternwood mansion (fig. 4) in
the Hollywood foothills, where the family “could no longer smell the stale sump water or
the oil, but they could still look out their front windows and see what had made them rich.
If they wanted to.” Again, The Big Sleep stresses characterisation and visual style rather
than events, through carefully controlled descriptions. Chandler’s characterisation of
Marlowe shows a complex and hesitant central figure, and the fact that he is presented to
us through first person narration enables us to develop an instant bond with this character,
sometimes even as a sidekick figure when he makes his way through the murky world of
crime.
Moreover, from the visual point of view, although the film cinematography does
not strive to create striking patterns, it presents some relevant elements of noir: the femme
fatale’s glamour and her insinuating silhouette, the dark compositions of the opening
43