Robert Mitchum is the definitive Philip Marlowe.

The ageing General Sternwood (James Stewart) is worried for his two daughters Camilla (Candy Clark) and Charlotte (Sarah Miles) and his £10 million fortune.

Philip Marlowe is asked by the General to investigate an attempt at blackmail on one of his daughters. In the meantime, Charlotte's gun-running husband has mysteriously disappeared.

Marlowe starts off with a simple case of blackmail but soon discovers a seedy world of crime hidden beneath the surface as murder follows murder.