Lew Harper is a Los Angeles based private investigator whose marriage to Susan Harper, who he still loves, is ending in imminent divorce since she can't stand being second fiddle to his work, which is always taking him away at the most inopportune of times. His latest client is tough talking and physically disabled Elaine Sampson, who wants him to find her wealthy husband, Ralph Sampson, missing now for twenty-four hours, ever since he disappeared at Van Nuys Airport after having just arrived from Vegas. No one seems to like Ralph, Elaine included. She believes he is cavorting with some woman, which to her would be more a fact than a problem. Harper got the case on the recommendation of the Sampsons' lawyer and Harper's personal friend, milquetoast Albert Graves, who is unrequitedly in love with Sampson's seductive daughter, Miranda Sampson. Miranda, who Harper later states throws herself at anything "pretty in pants", also has a decidedly cold relationship with her stepmother, Elaine. As Harper begins his investigation, he is often joined by one or two new sidekicks, Miranda, and/or Allan Taggert, Sampson's private pilot who was the last person to see him before his disappearance. Living on the Sampson estate, Allan is also Miranda's casual boyfriend who Harper coins "Beauty" because of his preppy good looks. They discover that Sampson has indeed been kidnapped as they receive a ransom note. As Harper follows leads, he ends up in the underbelly of Los Angeles society, which includes encounters with Betty Fraley, a junkie lounge singer, Fay Estabrook, an ex-movie ingénue now overweight alcoholic, and Claude, a religious cult leader. At each of Harper's stops, people seem to want to beat him up or worse kill him. The case takes a slight turn after they decide to pay the $500,000 ransom to see where it leads. Lew Harper, a cool private investigator, is hired by a wealthy California matron to locate her kidnapped husband. With just two Screenplays behind him - including an adaptation of his own novel, Soldier In The Rain - novelist Bill Goldman was tapped to script a Private Eye movie in the Chandler mould. He suggested Ross MacDonald's The Moving Target, the Producer concurred and the rest as they say … Following this assignment Goldman scripted another of his own novels (written under a John Doe) No Way To Treat A Lady and then, working again with Paul Newman, hit one out of the park with Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid.<br/><br/>By the mid 60s the Private Eye genre was dead in the water and Harper more or less revived it. When you hear the expression Private Eye the name Paul Newman doesn't spring immediately to mind and nor does he attempt to emulate Bogie, Dick Powell or indeed anyone else. Whether it was part of his contract or not Newman ends up with no real co-stars but a hell of a gallery of 'supporting' players from Lauren Bacall to Shelly Winters via Robert Wagner, Robert Webber, Julie Harris, Strother Martin and Arthur Hill, fresh from playing the male lead in Who's Afraid Of Viginia Woolf opposite Uta Hagen. The plot ducks and weaves and may be a tad overlong at two hours but Goldman keeps the dialogue sharp and throws in a couple of set-pieces that keep the pot boiling. Arguably showing its age but certainly worth watching. So where else could you get a chance to catch a fleshy Shelley Winters snore like a moose in heat. But you have to give it to the former glamour girl—she does the blowzy barfly really well. Poor Harper. Just the thought of maybe having to couple with her in the line of duty gives him the shakes and thoughts of a different line of work.<br/><br/>All in all, it's a good gumshoe movie. Harper (Newman) has to track down a kidnapped rich guy even though nobody really wants the old tyrant back. Certainly not his silken, sarcastic wife (Bacall), nor his shapely, spinning-top daughter (Tiffen), nor even the live-in pretty boy (Wagner). Still, gumshoe Harper gets to tour about every happening nightspot in '60's Hollywood, and we get to go along for the noisy ride. And catch the icky Strother Martin as the high priest of love, or is it the sun god, or maybe even the high priest of illegal aliens! Anyhow, there he is in his open-air temple on top one of those scrubby LA hills that burn every year. Yes indeed, no smog city movie would be complete without at least one of these wacko frauds.<br/><br/>I'll say this for Newman—he sure earns his money. I've never seen a PI get clobbered so many times without even a love tap in return. Lew Harper is clearly no Mike Hammer. And what's with the long-suffering wife (Leigh). Her role as Mrs. Harper sort of dangles from the plot like a glued on appendage. Nonetheless, if I were he, I'd be spending all my nights at home. But catch actress Julie Harris doing some big-time emoting. I knew her New York stage talents were in the cast for some good reason. And I really like the ending, so right for an American culture moving into a new era.<br/><br/>No, this gumshoe saga won't make you forget the Maltese Falcon or even Kiss Me Deadly, but it's sure a colorful way to pass an entertaining couple of hours. Some excellent directorial touches and solid thesping are evident in the colorful and plush production. Abundance of comedy and sometimes extraneous emphasis on cameo characters make for a relaxed pace and imbalanced concept, resulting in overlength and telegraphing of climax.
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