The Big Sleep (1946 film) E. Jackson were completely eliminated. Because of the two versions created by the re-shooting, there is a substantial difference in content of some twenty minutes between them, although the difference in running time is two minutes. Novelist Raymond Chandler said Martha Vickers (Carmen) overshadowed Lauren Bacall (Vivian) in their scenes together, which led the producers to delete much of Vickers' performance to enhance Bacall's. The re-shot, re-edited and revised "The Big Sleep" was finally released on 23 August 1946. The cinematic release of "The Big Sleep" is regarded as more successful than the 1945 pre-release version (see below), even though
The Book of Dust quipped that it alternatively be titled "His Darker Materials". Pullman conceived "The Book of Dust" before the publication of "Lyra's Oxford" in 2003. On his website in April 2005, he wrote that the book was "under way". In 2007, he described it as "a big, big book". In a 2009 interview with Oxford University newspaper "Cherwell", Pullman stated that "The Book of Dust" was "growing" but that he was "encountering complexities that seem to be making it longer than I thought it would be." In 2011, Pullman said that he was considering writing "The Book of Dust" in two volumes,