General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

The Big Sleep (1978 film)

The Big Sleep is a 1978 neo-noir crime film written and directed by Michael Winner, based on Raymond Chandler's 1939 novel of the same name and starring Robert Mitchum as private detective Philip Marlowe. It is the second film version of the novel, following Howard Hawks's 1946 adaptation with Humphrey Bogart, and it moves the story from the novel's Los Angeles setting to 1970s London.¹^•²

Key fact	Detail
Director and writer	Michael Winner, who wrote the screenplay as well as directing¹
Source	The novel The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler (New York, 1939)²
Setting change	Relocated from Los Angeles to London, which Winner said was more faithful to Chandler's original vision¹
Lead	Robert Mitchum as Philip Marlowe, a role he first played in Farewell, My Lovely (1975)¹
Budget	Estimated at $5 million in a 6 July 1977 Variety news item¹
Release	New York opening the week of 15 March 1978; Los Angeles opening 29 March 1978²
Format	99 minutes, color, Panavision, MPAA rating R; a United Kingdom–United States production²
Reception	Negative overall from critics; 57% on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer from 7 reviews¹^•³

Spoilers

Cast and story

Robert Mitchum plays Philip Marlowe, providing voice-over narration throughout the film in keeping with the first-person narrative of the source novel.¹ The supporting cast includes Sarah Miles as Charlotte Sternwood, Richard Boone as Lash Canino, Candy Clark as Camilla Sternwood, Joan Collins as Agnes Lozelle, Edward Fox as Joe Brody, John Mills as Inspector Carson, Oliver Reed as Eddie Mars, and James Stewart as General Sternwood.²

In the story, Marlowe drives to the English estate of General Sternwood, a wealthy, ailing American who is being blackmailed over his younger daughter Camilla's gambling debt to a bookseller, Arthur Gwynn Geiger. Marlowe discovers that Geiger's bookshop is a front for pornography, and the blackmail case turns to murder. The General's older daughter Charlotte's husband, Rusty Regan, has recently disappeared, and Marlowe's investigation draws him into the criminal world of the gangster Eddie Mars.²^•⁴

Production

Principal photography began on 1 August 1977 in London, England.² Variety initially estimated the shoot would take a minimum of nine weeks, revising the estimate to eight weeks on 31 August 1977.¹ The film was produced by Elliott Kastner and Michael Winner through the Winkast Company with ITC, photographed by Robert Paynter, with production design by Harry Pottle and music by Jerry Fielding.¹^•² The song "Won't Somebody Dance With Me," with music and lyrics by Lynsey de Paul, appears in the film.²

Rights and distribution. United Artists had purchased the film rights to Chandler's novel from Warner Bros. UA clashed with the producers when it wanted to market the picture to a few select territories rather than worldwide, and it "ceded" its rights to produce the story while remaining attached as distributor.¹ A Variety article also listed the Rank Organization as a producer with minority participation, though Rank is not credited onscreen.¹ United Artists registered the copyright on 12 May 1978.²

The London relocation

The most discussed change from the novel and the 1946 film is the setting. Writer-director Michael Winner located his version in London, believing this more faithful to Chandler's original vision of the story, according to interviews in the 31 August 1977 Variety and the October 1977 Films & Filming.¹ A contemporary Washington Post report noted that the filmmakers claimed Chandler "would have been delighted" by the change because he had lived in London himself, and argued that the relocation made the blackmail premise implausible in the permissive 1970s.⁵

Reception

Despite occasional positive reviews, critical reception was negative overall.¹ On Rotten Tomatoes the film holds a 57% Tomatometer from 7 critics and a 28% audience score from more than 1,000 ratings.³

Roger Ebert's review. Roger Ebert, the Chicago Sun-Times critic who won the Pulitzer Prize for criticism in 1975, gave the film two and a half stars. He wrote that the 1978 version "isn't a classic, but it does make sense," aided by Mitchum's voice-over narration and flashbacks, yet the audience is still left mystified by Chandler's complicated plot. He praised Mitchum as "a definitive screen presence," along with Candy Clark as the younger daughter and Richard Boone as a hired killer, but called the movie "kind of embalmed" and judged the move from 1940s Los Angeles to contemporary London a mistake, noting that Mitchum's Marlowe had worked far better in the period setting of Farewell, My Lovely (1975).⁶

Later assessments. Time Out's retrospective review called the London relocation "spurious" and wrote that Mitchum "seems to sleepwalk through the part," finding the film lacking the seediness and menace of the earlier Marlowe remake Farewell, My Lovely.⁷ A scholarly study in the journal Adaptation analyzed the remake through Hans Vermeer's skopos theory, examining how its meaning depends on Chandler's novel, the 1946 Hawks version, film noir, and the contrasting star images of Humphrey Bogart and Robert Mitchum.⁸ A 2013 article on age and masculinity in the film observed that, despite its famous cast, Winner's movie met with little popular, critical, or academic interest.⁹

Home media and streaming

The film has remained available on home video and streaming. In the United States it has streamed on Amazon Prime Video, Shout! Factory, Tubi, Plex, and other ad-supported services, with rental and purchase options on Apple TV, Amazon Video, and Fandango at Home.⁴

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026