Along with Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler was the author who pulled detective fiction out of the Edwardian drawing rooms and into the mean streets. His hard-boiled stories set the stage for film noir; The Big Sleep (1946) is considered a classic. Chandler was also hired by Hollywood to write original screenplays, among them, The Blue Dahlia (1946).
Farewell, My Lovely was the first Chandler story to be filmed—but under a different title, The Falcon Takes Over (1942). RKO Studio purchased rights for a paltry sum and squeezed the story into a light-hearted series starring suave George Sanders as a detective called The Falcon.
Rarely seen, The Falcon Takes Over will be screened as part of the FOCUS film series, 7 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 11 at the Church in the City, 2648 N. Hackett Ave. More information on the series is available here.
