Better film noir than Philip Marlowe, The Brasher Doubloon, adapted from Raymond Chandler's “The High Window,” has been recognized for its evocative photography and the coterie of character actors who make up for George Montgomery as an ineffectual Marlowe. The shamus here searches for a rare coin over which a number of murders have occurred, with more to come. David Thomson (“Biographical Dictionary of Films”) calls The Brasher Doubloon “a very Germanic Chandler adaptation,” and the “Film Noir Encyclopedia” (Silver & Ward, ed.) notes: “The film is filled with moody, low-key images supported by a dense and occasionally threatening background.... The script is bland but filled with the type of dialogue and grotesque characterizations that distinguish the film noir from an ordinary thriller....” German expressionist actor Fritz Kortner “brings a sense of aberrant vitality to Chandler's truncated story,” while Florence Bates stands out as Marlowe's wealthy, stealthy client, and Nancy Guild as her secretive secretary.