I'm glad they changed the private eye's name, because Lew Archer this ain't. This film has considerable style, and some wit, but it is much slicker and more commonplace than the original novel. Newman is cynical and brittle, but that's about all. His performance lacks moral depth.

With an all star cast like this, you would think that this would be a suspenseful, well acted potbolier. But it's only one step above an episode of Dragnet at times.

I love Paul Newman in this. He's so much fun to watch and I bet he had a lot of fun making it. One of my favorite performances from him. The rest of the cast is filled with stars who are perfectly cast. William Goldman's screenplay is very good too.

This is a nice film noir that keeps you interested all the way through the film. It is no surprise that Paul Newman is great in the title role.

Cracking PI film with an excellent quirky performance from Newman. Why isn't this better known?

one of the only hard boiled adaptations that keeps the protagonist witty, bad ass, and makes you want to be him. bacall and leigh end up being completely dubious in their acting. i easily anticipated the killer's identity before the murder even took place. i shook my head uncontrollably at not the predictability, but that laughable handling of an ending. if only it hadn't been a freeze frame.

One of the "H" movies that made Newman a star and kept him one. Good detective fiction in high gloss

Up to a point, it's a smashing adaptataion of Ross Macdonald's novel THE MOVING TARGET, with Newman creditable as the bizarrely renamed Lew Archer. But the ending dumps all the emotional and psychological complexity (not to mention the villain's entire motiovation) of Mac's story in favor of an incomprehensible freeze frame -- easily one of the worst endings to any movie, ever. If it were a book you'd throw it across the room.

Newman is cast well. The film moves perhaps too slickly for its own good, but it's good genre work.