Harper [The Moving Target] **** (1966, Paul Newman, Lauren Bacall, Julie Harris, Robert Wagner, Janet Leigh, Shelley Winters) – Classic Movie Review 1,302

The hard-boiled 1966 detective-mystery thriller film Harper [The Moving Target] casts Paul Newman in an ideal guise as Lew Harper, an archetypal Los Angeles private eye.

Director Jack Smight’s hard-boiled American 1966 detective-mystery thriller film Harper [The Moving Target] casts Paul Newman in an ideal guise as Lew Harper, an archetypal Los Angeles mean streets private eye, who is hired by the rich, wounded and woeful Mrs Sampson (Lauren Bacall) to find her missing husband.

The money-driven, crazy, alcoholic and egotistical multi-millionaire Ralph Sampson has disappeared after flying from Las Vegas to LA. Mrs Sampson, disabled from a horseback riding accident, doesn’t seem even to like her husband and believes he has gone off with another woman, but she wants to know where he is.

After meeting Mrs Sampson, Harper starts his investigation by interviewing Mrs Sampson’s spoiled, seductive, sexy step-daughter, Miranda (Pamela Tiffin), and her handsome, amiable casual boyfriend Allan Taggert (Robert Wagner), the missing husband’s private pilot.

Screenwriter William Goldman makes an excellent job of adapting Ross Macdonald’s 1949 novel The Moving Target to the screen, producing a richly textured, engrossing, highly polished screenplay. Goldman, who was a big admirer of Macdonald and suggested making this movie to producer Elliot Kastner, won the 1967 Edgar Award for Best Motion Picture Screenplay.

However, Goldman’s screenplay aside, it is the charismatic acting from the stupendous cast that really delivers the goods. Shelley Winters, Arthur Hill, Julie Harris, Janet Leigh, Robert Wagner, Pamela Tiffin and Robert Webber all make their mark in the all-star cast.

And it helps too that a series of fine character actors – Strother Martin, Harold Gould, Roy Jenson, Martin West, Jacqueline deWit, Eugene Iglesias and Richard Carlyle – are also in the cast, providing texture to their little scenes.

Jack Smight directs Newman.

Director Smight’s thoroughly involving, atmospheric, quick-moving, satisfyingly twisty movie is a first-rate version of the film noir thriller. It’s really only a pastiche, mimicking Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler, but it now has become recognised and valued as the real thing and a bit of a classic in itself. It was a good-sized hit, taking $12 million on a $3.5 million budget.

Often Paul Newman does not seem to be taking his role or the material seriously enough, in a sometimes comedic performance, busy and twitchy, though later in the movie, his serious side kicks in, and his acting is all the better for it. Newman gives an excellent physical performance, running and threatening ideally, but seems too handsome, small-built and unmuscular for the tough action when it comes. The serious side of the story kicks later in the movie, too. The material is astonishingly cynical, sadistically violent, and just plain unpleasant, and in the true noir fashion there is hardly a good soul in sight, certainly not among the main characters.

Janet Leigh is as tough as nails as Harper’s sad, estranged wife. Bacall, Winters and Harris are all playing women past their sell-by dates, which is quite cruel to the actresses. Bacall relishes her bitchy lines, Winters over-eggs the pudding of her fat, blousy, alcoholic former beauty character, amusingly, while Harris milks the tragic side of her character, to as much effect as humanly possible. Tiffin and Wagner entertain as good-looking, worthlessly good-time folk. Arthur Hill and Robert Webber add some dramatic chills as Harper’s lawyer buddy and Winters’ husband.

The film changes the name of Macdonald’s lead character from Lew Archer to Lew Harper, apparently because Newman thought names beginning with H were lucky for him – The Hustler, Hombre and Hud. Also the producers only bought the rights to the one novel in Macdonald’s book series. So, as Goldman later wrote, ‘we needed a different name and Harper seemed OK, the guy harps on things, it’s essentially what he does for a living.’

It’s a surprise that the liberal-minded actor Newman would allow himself to utter the word  ‘faggot’, but then his less than admirable character is also busy killing people and beating people up, in between being regularly beaten up himself.

The exterior cinematography is smart and exciting, though the studio interiors and blue screen shots let the movie down, and damage credibility. The  score is an interesting period artefact.

The 1949 novel The Moving Target by Ross Macdonald, writing under the pseudonym John Macdonald, introduced the detective Lew Archer, who figured in a further 17 novels.

Goldman wrote a script for a follow-up Archer/Harper film, based on The Chill, Ross Macdonald’s 11th Lew Archer novel, published in 1964, but that movie was never made.

Newman said: “It’s a Bogie kind of film but Harper has more of a sense of humour about his job.’  Humphrey Bogart’s private detectives, Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon and Philip Marlowe in The Big Sleep, became the models for detectives in other noir films.

Frank Sinatra made the mistake of turning it down, like he did Dirty Harry.

Newman filmed an effective but inferior sequel as Lew Harper in 1975 called The Drowning Pool.

Leigh and Wagner starred together in 1954’s Prince Valiant. Bacall starred in the 1946 film noir masterpiece The Big Sleep with Humphrey Bogart as Chandler’s detective Philip Marlowe.

Lauren Bacall (Betty Joan Perske (September 16, 1924 – August 12, 2014).

Adored screen legend Lauren Bacall died on August 12 2014, aged 89.

Paul Newman (January 26, 1925 – September 26, 2008)

Paul Newman won the Academy Award for Best Actor for The Color of Money (1986). His Oscar-nominated performances are in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958), The Hustler (1961), Hud (1963), Cool Hand Luke (1967),  Absence of Malice (1981), The Verdict (1982), Nobody’s Fool (1994), and Road to Perdition (2002).

Pamela Tiffin Wonso (October 13, 1942 – December 2, 2020)

Pamela Tiffin retired from acting in 1974 after marrying her second husband philosopher Edmondo Danon and becoming a mother of two daughters. She died from natural causes on December 2, 2020, aged 78.

The cast

The cast are Paul Newman as Lew Harper, Lauren Bacall as Elaine Sampson, Julie Harris as Betty Fraley, Arthur Hill as Albert Graves, Janet Leigh as Susan Harper, Pamela Tiffin as Miranda Sampson, Robert Wagner as Allan Taggert, Robert Webber as Dwight Troy, Shelley Winters as Fay Estabrook, Harold Gould as Sheriff Spanner, Roy Jenson as Puddler, Strother Martin as Claude, Martin West as deputy, Jacqueline deWit as Mrs Kronberg, Eugene Iglesias as Felix, and Richard Carlyle as Fred Platt.

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© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 1,302

Link to Derek Winnert’s home page for more film reviews: http://derekwinnert.com/