CHINATOWN

The Data Points

• Year Released: 1974

• Runtime: 130 Minutes

• Directed: Roman Polanski

• Produced: Robert Evans, C.O. Erickson

• Starring: Jack Nicholson, Faye Dunaway, John Huston, Perry Lopez

• Oscars:

  • Won: Best Original Screenplay (Robert Towne); would have been more if not for a little film called The Godfather Part II

  • Nominated: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Nicholson), Best Actress (Dunaway), Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction, Best Costume Design, Best Editing, Best Sound, Best Score

• IMDb Plot Summary: A private detective hired to expose an adulterer finds himself caught up in a web of deceit, corruption, and murder.

Why Chinatown is Great

The Story and Themes. Towne created an instantly timeless gem when he wrote the script in the 70’s, set in the 30’s and lifting directly from the film noir/mystery/private investigator movies of that era. He was also born in Los Angeles and interested in exploring the tumultuous origins of the city he lived in; the nefarious plot that Jake uncovers involving holding the city’s water essentially for ransom in order to make land holdings more valuable and extending the corruption into the city’s government is based loosely on events that took place in the early 1900s. Jake’s stumbling into this vast conspiracy plays similarly to both slow-burn mystery thrillers from the time in which it is set and the more contemporary paranoid thrillers of the 70’s such as The Parallax View and All the President’s Men. His constant juggling of helping the police, who he used to work for in Chinatown, and evading/obstructing them to solve the mystery himself is also ripped from classic film noir. The rest of classic noir trappings are here as well, such as a femme fatale, a wealthy villain, and an endlessly crafty main character with a good heart buried under layers of toughness, due to past experiences.

The corruption that the film explores, however, isn’t just limited to the city government or police department; this film is interested in the corruption of the human soul. This story’s “original sin” isn’t revealed until late in the story, which is the fact that the wealthy and slimy Noah Cross had impregnated his own daughter, Evelyn, when she was only 15. On top of that, to continue building up his unimaginable wealth, he will lie, cheat the city out of its water to irrigate his own lands (purchased under names of the unknowing elderly), and is ultimately revealed to have killed Hollis Mulwray when Hollis refused to go along with his schemes. Mulwray may have participated in corrupt acts in the past but is described by Evelyn at the end as a very decent man seeking to make amends. What was done to her at such a young age is what’s corrupted her to become the femme fatale that we meet early in the story; she also embraces the fact that she’ll have to keep her hands dirty to protect her daughter, who is the only completely innocent character in the film. Being the unscrupulous force of nature that he is, Cross is after her as well.

Jake’s “corruption” plays just like Evelyn’s; he was previously a policeman in Chinatown, and that place has come to represent his tragic past that turned him into the jaded character we spend the entire story with. The corrupt system of policing and a tragic death has tainted him into becoming a private investigator who spends his time exposing adultery, but the circumstances of the film and his ultimately good heart push him towards having to return to the source of his trauma; Chinatown itself. The film’s ending scene there is one of the bleakest statements ever put to such a popular mainstream film that I’ve seen; after Jake has arranged for the police, Evelyn, and Cross to all be in the same place so that the truth may come out, he isn’t allowed to speak before Evelyn confronts Cross as she is trying to leave, brandishes a gun, and is shot and killed as she tries to drive away. Cross claims Katherine as his own, whisks her away, as Jake stares on dumbfounded and utterly broken. He’s then told to forget it, because “it’s Chinatown” after all.

The Performances. This cast is dynamite. Perry Lopez’s Detective Escobar, having known Jake previously, is great as one of the characters seemingly plucked from classic film noir as well as a conduit into Jake’s conflicted past. John Huston, who directed some great American films such as the Treasure of the Sierra Madre, is both utterly magnetic and utterly repulsive as the slimy Noah Cross, one of the evilest characters that 70’s cinema conjured up. I also want to shout out Darrell Zwerling as the owlish Hollis Mulwray; as Jake is following him in the early goings of the film, we immediately get the feeling he’s not likely cheating on his wife and that he is investigating something odd in his own right. Faye Dunaway perfectly portrays Evelyn, tapping into some classic femme fatale tropes for the first half of the film, before some of her buried trauma begins to surface and the sense of tragedy following her character begins to reveal itself, yet she’s also effectively communicating the fact that she’s holding something back with every revelation. Jack Nicholson, in almost every shot of the movie, gives one of the signature performances of the decade in one of the signature films of the decade as Jake Gittes. There is repressed trauma, charm, sarcasm, the faintest shade of tenderness, and an awful lot of world-weariness powering this character.

Technicalities. Before I praise his direction, it’s worth mentioning that Roman Polanski is a monster; he fled the U.S. in 1978 after pleading guilty to “unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor” to avoid a full statutory rape charge – he now rarely leaves France. Momentarily separating the art from the artist, his direction in this film is flawless; he created a variety of moods and atmospheres scene by scene be they suspense, humor, brief terror, or visual intrigue. However, never far from the screen is the air of semi-romantic tragedy that the musical theme played over the opening credits introduces us to, nor is the jaded feeling brought out by the script or Nicholson’s performance. He employed a very modern (for the 70’s) style of gritty filmmaking, employing handheld cameras and long takes; like L.A. Confidential, he brought the era in which the film was released to the era in which it was set, as opposed to the other way around. Cinematographer John A. Alonzo desaturates the colors with the slightest layer of sepia, and the effect is tremendous: the pale, sun-drenched hues bring to life the drought that the script describes, gives us a sense of the dustiness of the desert city of L.A., and evokes the bygone era of monochromatic filmmaking. There are spots of beauty in the film, but the most searing images are the bone-bleached whites and grays that Jake makes his way through.

The Legacy of Chinatown. Once again, Roman Polanski’s criminality taints this film with every watch, no matter how enjoyable it may be. Getting past that, however, we get to bask in one of the best screenplays ever written; not just for its richly layered story, nor its exceptional pace in unspooling a vast conspiracy, nor its unforgettable characters, but also for its infectious dialogue. It grossed $30 million off a $6 million dollar budget and was nominated for 11 Academy Awards; without the Godfather Part II also in that year, I think (hope might be a better word) that Chinatown would have picked up more awards. This film was also likely well-received upon release due to how its themes of corruption connected with a 1974 audience; public opinion had shifted firmly against the extended Vietnam war, and the previous year audiences had watched a summer full of increasingly damning hearings about Nixon’s involvement in the Watergate scandal, had watched him fire a series of government officials investigating him, had watched Nixon’s FBI storm the building the investigators were using, had watched as Articles of Impeachment were brought against him, and then watched as he resigned in August of 1974. While this may have ensured Chinatown’s success in ’74, its greatness has kept it relevant in the years since; come for a classic mystery film, stay for an entertaining trip to the darkest corners of the human soul.

John’s Highlight Reel

• Introduction. If you want to make a movie, you should introduce your main character the way that Jake is introduced here; is there a better first line than “you can’t eat the Venetian blinds, Curly, I just had them installed on Wednesday”? We immediately understand Gittes’ profession, his attitude towards life, his loneliness, and also get a sense of a compassionate heart buried under it all.

• Tailing Mulwray. Here’s just the pure visual storytelling we don’t see often enough anymore; rather than Jake explaining how he’s going to tail Mulwray, he just does it onscreen. This segment opens with what seems like an irrelevant hearing on water, irrigation, and dam building, but little does Jake know that this is the stuff of the conspiracy that he’ll begin unraveling soon. We also get the sense, through the staging, shots, and performances, that Gittes doesn’t think that Mulwray is having an affair with anyone, and that there might be something more going on here.

• Reservoir. We visit this location twice, but I want to shout out both scenes; the first employs a lot of handheld camera work and long takes to make us feel like we’re strolling along with Jake and some of his former cop buddies in broad, sun-bleached daylight, ending with the sudden reveal that Mulwray has drowned in the storm drain. Jake later returns with the last gasp of a beautiful sunset lighting the area, and a much spookier feel to the same location. A very brutal move involving a knife and a nose lets us know that when this movie throws a punch, it doesn’t hold back.

• Lunches. Again folding two scenes into one, we get our first real time spent with the characters of Evelyn Mulwray and Noah Cross. Evelyn’s feels like its flung straight out the 1940’s – including the duplicity, cat-and-mouse conversation, and lingering questions – with one exception: Jake’s massive bandage for his nose. This is a perfect symbol for how this film updates the romantic beauty of the film noir genre with the inherent ugliness in life, particularly the kind of life that Jake leads. The lunch with Cross, on the other hand, is set on his barren ranch that feels almost otherworldly; we get a sense that there’s more to Cross than we have yet to see, but we have no idea of the depths of his evil.

• Romance. I mean we all saw it coming based on our knowledge of the genre, but the scene in which Nicholson and Dunaway are lying in bed together after being intimate contains some of the most subtle yet emotionally affecting writing and acting in the whole film; we finally get a sense of the tragedy that’s been following Jake around and defining his loneliness and understand that he and Evelyn are kindred souls.

• The Truth. Evelyn’s revelation about her past with her father is as shocking today as it was in 1974, and completely flips the film on its head; the previous hour and a half’s complex water-based conspiracy feels like a distraction to the personal trauma that Cross wrought on his own daughter. This twist also telegraphed through Evelyn’s continual holding back and noticed anxiety when it comes to discussing her father, but even the most perceptive audience member has no idea this is coming. When we get our first look at Katherine, Polanski dressed her in a white dress that, when contrasted to Evelyn’s look, presents her as this movie’s final remaining innocent symbol; Jake immediately recognizes and chooses to protect this.

• Chinatown. The staging is perfectly messy and frustrating; the overlapping and chaotic dialogue creates a disorienting sensation, and the camera movements add to the chaos before holding excruciatingly long on Evelyn’s car after the shots have been fired. Hope for a happy ending slips away quickly and is snatched from us entirely before we even know what happened. After the most famous closing line in history is uttered, Jake is dragged away by his friends as the camera elevates upward; the same movement as at the end of Casablanca, but while that ending was inspirational, moving and even exciting, all we’re left with is the empty feeling that good cannot prevail against evil entrenched in wealth and governmental institutions. It will never not work; Chinatown is one for the ages.