If five o'clock shadows are sexy, how come my wife always wants me to shave?: "The Big Sleep"

He wasn't very tall, he made Richard Nixon look clean-shaven, and he never could lose that lisp. Yet somehow Humphrey Bogart was a big star. Hell, he even had a golf term named after him.

I own "Casablanca" and had seen "The Maltese Falcon," but my movie watching resume was missing "The Big Sleep," featuring Bogey's turn as famous private eye Philip Marlowe. Seemed like an easy enough thing to remedy thanks to TCM, but man, does this movie make you work. "The Usual Suspects" was "Bambi" by comparison.

The plot starts simply enough: Some rich guy wants Marlowe to keep an eye on his younger daughter, but Marlowe gets an itch down under after verbally sparring with the older daughter. Then people start getting killed, and I was starting to wish I had taken notes. Did I learn nothing from college? Well, other than what a "Century Club" and "MILF" are ...

Anyway, despite being a tad confusing, this movie wasn't boring, and it's hard not to like Bogart. He delivers plenty of fun lines here while walking that fine line between joker and tough guy. The lack of distinctive supporting players, i.e. Peter Lorre, Claude Rains and Sydney Greenstreet from "Casablanca," hurt a bit, and I'm not sure Lauren Bacall does much for me. Her little sister was much more interesting, and probably even more so in a hotel that rents by the hour.