A couple of weeks ago I finished reading The Big Sleep.
It was my second attempt at the novel and the second Raymond Chandler book that I’ve read.
Chandler had created the quintessential hardboiled PI with Phillip Marlowe.
His detective is idiosyncratic living by his own code unlike anybody else around him.
This code allows for variations of gray in some areas and definitive black and white lines in others.
He talks flippantly when shouldn’t and is tight lipped when candidness would be in his best interest.
Marlowe pushes the boundaries of law in order to aid his client (whether they request it or not) often putting himself at great risk.
A bottle of rye seems to be his closest companion as he gumshoes out into the street as a martyr, working for clients who seem unworthy of his services.
Though self depreciating, I believe that deep inside Marlowe thinks he is the smartest (if not moral) man in
Los Angeles.
Jimmy McNulty from HBO’s and David Simon’s The Wire seems to be cut from the same cloth. Sure there are some obvious differences starting with the gloomy location of drug infested Baltimore (though both have a love-hate relationship with their city) and the fact that McNulty has been married and rarely turns down easy sex. (Marlowe is a chaste knight always rebuffing the women who throw themselves at him.) However the similarities are overwhelming. Almost everything I mentioned in the above paragraph can be applied to McNulty’s police work. He will alienate anybody he is close to in order to follow through on a case. Burning bridges is a simple necessity in order to move forward. Though McNulty works for a team, he often acts like Marlowe, going his own way regardless of whether he is in violation of direct orders.
What do you think?
2 comments:
I hope you'll forgive a late comment to this post.
I too have had similar thoughts. I often thought that much of the final paragraph ("But down these mean streets a man must go ...") of Chandler's essay, The Simple Art of Murder, applies to McNulty.
I also think that there are minor noir chords that seasons one and two of The Wire strike. In season one McNulty ultimately faces a down ending not only of his own choosing, but one that he unwittingly initiated at the beginning of the season.
Similarly, Frank Sobtka finds his own demise in season two as a result of actions he initiated.
I wouldn't feel comfortable saying that The Wire is noir, but its presence is there.
Thanks so much, Brian! It's funny, with Chandler's quote about the detective, I'd apply it more to Omar than McNulty. When Bunk first questions Omar, they discuss how a man's gotta have a code. Omar never seems to waver or get distracted. He has goals, he states them and then follows through with them mostly by himself. The Wire as whole seems too complete and balanced for noir. Season 2 might come the closest to full noir since almost all is vain except for Major Valchek getting his idiot stain glass hung in the church.
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