The difference is Spade's monologue in the end.
He has to turn her over, because she's a thief, a seductress, a liar, and most of all she killed his partner.
As he said it didn't matter what you thought of him, he was your partner and you had to do something about his murder.
There was no grey in the Maltese Falcon, in some ways they all are guilty of something. Spade mostly in solving the case but probably pushing the bounds of legality in order to solve it.
Marlowe's world is the same but there's more grey. He wanted to protect the General as best as he could. But fell in love with Vivian. He knew there was a mystery, within the mystery. His hunch was everyone kept hiding what happened to Regan.
Too many people were trying to get him to drop it. But his hunch, and his intuition wouldn't let it go.
Both books are excellent. But Chandler's prose is like looking at a Rembrandt. Even in the darkness, and shadows add to the story.
Honestly if you read The Big Sleep. It's perfect for modern audiences. Murder, Geiger and Carol are a gay couple, Geiger runs a high class pornographic book service. Carmen was photographed naked in front of Geiger's body.
Carmen was in Marlowe's bed nude trying to seduce him. Carmen seems very much like the rich weird celebrity families these days.
Marlowe is the weary, tough, detective that's seen too much, and knows the evil that men and women do.
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molypocho
9 years ago
Of course, I'm not concerned with judging the movies by the books. Art should stand alone.
Spade doesn't have to turn her over. He chooses to turn her over because it provides him with the most beneficial outcome. Simply put, he weighs the odds and decides that solving the crime means more to him than the woman he loves. Outwardly, it looks like justice, but, from Spade's subjective perspective, it's a matter of cruelly reasoned apathy. This inward conflict provides Spade's character with the kind of compelling depth that Marlowe lacks.
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