Author: gracieeppler

There is no doubt that Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe are masculine. Their masculinity is aggressive, almost suffocating. They drink continuously throughout the day, go wherever they want to go whenever they want (even without a gun, if you’re Spade, because he is so manly he only needs to rely on his own fists), flirt with tons of beautiful women with figures they can admire, and avoid feminine products like “filter papers,” opting for the more masculine “course ground coffee” instead (Chandler 195). They make jaded comments like “[all women are the same] after the first nine,” but admit that they really “don’t know anything about women,” because women are an entirely different species all together (Chandler 225, Hammot 17).

Brigid O’Shaughnessy, Effie Perine, Anne Riordan, and Velma are undoubtably feminine. They flaunt their curves and use their sex to get what they want, depend upon men to give them protection, rush to aide and assist their suitors (especially Effie and Anne), and often act like children in need of a tissue to blow their nose into and a long nap. To be a woman, according to noir novels, is to be beautiful, but weak and afraid.

 A woman’s fear is dangerous. Velma kills Malloy because “she was afraid of him,” as did Brigid, frightened by the interest these men gave them. A woman’s fear (and its consequent outcomes) is hysterical, impulsive, and irreversible.

 However, a man’s fear is different. In certain doses, it is acceptable—even desirable to make a man more relatable. Jameson argues that the reason why Humphrey Bogard “obviously stands for the hero” and was able to “[distinguish himself] from the other stars of his period” was in his very ability “to show fear” (20). Because Bogart admits that the dark and violent world around him is unpredictable and dangerous, he becomes powerful and attractive to watch on the screen. Philip Marlowe admits plainly that “[he’s] scared stiff” because up until then, he has remained relatively steely and decisive.

At a certain level, the heroic, smart, inherently masculine antihero accepting “feminine” qualities is appropriate. It makes the man even more of a man because he is able to admit his “feminine” faults while still remaining powerful and dominant, and while solving the mystery in the end. Noir reveals a realm in which gender stereotypes are blended together in such a way that the strength of man and the weakness of women are reinforced.

When I think of the Sam Spades in my life (and unfortunately, there are many), I am overwhelmed with a sense of spite and a desire to both humble and embarrass them. The boy I met at Domerfest who told me “People say I look like Chris Evans,” a student Senator who signs her email signature as “Future Supreme Court Justice ’28,” the CEO I met networking who refused to make eye contact with any females that came to his station—they all elicit a certain reaction within me that makes me more violent and confrontational than I’d like to admit.

And yet, Sam Spade is a character I found myself not only rooting for but found myself wanting to get a chance to interact with. Sure, he’s cocky and selfish, views women as a commodity and sees non-Anglo-Saxon people as less than himself, but for all his smart remarks and vanity, I have to wonder if some of that arrogance is deserved.

 Without inspecting his partner Miles’ body, without talking to any witnesses, Sam Spade utters two words that convince me that he has figured out the mystery 18 pages into the novel: “Damn her.” Spade’s abnormal reaction to the death of his coworker prove that firstly, his relationship with Miles was strained, and that secondly, he knew what had happened. He has no desire to search his partner’s corpse or to question Brigid, but instead returns home and got himself drunk, “scowling” as he thought about “her.” This “her” had to be Brigid, the woman who despite all of her tricks, lies, and wrongdoings, Spade invites back.

 Perhaps Spade has the same noxious relationship with Ms. O’Shaughnessy that I share with him: an acknowledgement that the other is a bad person, that they have fatal flaws, and yet, a desire to be with them, to see their next clever move.

 “You always think you know what you’re doing,” Effie warns Sam before he fully dives into the mess of the aftermath of the murder and the hunt for the Maltese Falcon. But perhaps, as Spade’s words and actions prove at the end of the novel, this is because he does, in fact, know what he’s doing. He knows Brigid is evil and damned, and yet, he appreciates her figure and her sharp sense of wit and capitalizes upon this.

 When the District Attorney later questions Sam on who killed Thursby, Sam replies that he doesn’t know, and even if he did know, “[he] wouldn’t” disclose it. “Everybody,” Spade says, “has something to conceal,” and in Spade’s case, he chooses to conceal “[his] guesses” (145). This comes from a sense of pride, a desire to be the only one to solve the case and a superiority complex that while everyone is scrambling around, Sam Spade sits, surveying, knowing.

Perhaps then, that is the reason why I love Sam Spade so much even though he is so womanizing and cocky: his confidence is justified. The Sam Spades in my life have never solved a murder hours after it occurred and certainly aren’t as clever as the “blond Satan” himself, so they must be humbled. Sam Spade’s toxicity, on the other hand, can be tolerated.