The Diseased
One of my all-time favorite improvs in a Robert Altman film -- fast, loose, totally spur-of-the-moment -- is one spoken by Elliot Gould in The Long Goodbye.
Phillip Marlowe (Gould) is speaking to a couple of local officials in a small Mexican town about the death of old friend Terry Lennox (Jim Bouton ), whom Marlowe has always known deep down to be a frosty taker-user- manipulator. Speaking in typical heavily-accented, south-of-the-border English, one of the officials says, "You were acquainted with the deceased?" And Marlowe/Gould says, "The diseased?...yeah, right." Deft stuff like this never turned up in any other director's films.
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Posted by Jeffrey Wells on November 25, 2006 at 8:58 AM
comment #1
JD
says ...
That's a great moment -- and The Long Goodbye is arguably Altman's greatest film -- but are you sure it's improv? Having read some scripts for Altman films, I don't think he applied improv to quite the degree that people think. He let actors re-work lines and, if 10 people were in a scene, 9 were making stuff up... but the main dialogue didn't always deviate from the script, even when it appeared to. Like John Cassavetes, one of Altman's great, unheralded gifts was his ability to make scripted dialogue sound improvised. And don't underestimate the considerable talents of Leigh Brackett and Raymond Chandler. This definitely sounds like the kind of line one of them could have thought up.
Posted by JD
at November 25, 2006 9:50 AM
comment #2
gabriela24
says ...
I do not know but I liked the movie. after all,nothing says goodby like a boolet, right?
Asigurare RCA
Posted by gabriela24
at January 24, 2012 4:12 AM