Summary:
A private eye in 1930s Los Angeles finds himself caught up in a web of deceit after being hired by a woman who is not who she seems.
My Thoughts:
Polanski was in his prime during the 1970s. “Chinatown” came out after “Rosemary’s Baby” and “Macbeth”, but before the scandal that would forever tarnish his career, and before his acclaimed European films: “The Tenant”, “Tess”, and “The Pianist” (for which he won the Academy Award for Best Director). “Chinatown” isn’t just a great movie from a fantastic director; it’s a genre-defining film.
Noir films were more a part of the cultural mainstream during the 1930s through the 1950s than they are today. Hardboiled detective films used to flood the theaters of yesteryear as superhero films flood theaters today. Everyone from Humphrey Bogart (“The Maltese Falcon”) to Jimmy Stewart (“Vertigo”) to Orson Welles (“The Third Man”) donned the fedora and proverbial magnifying glass. As fads do, noir films passed out of fashion, and we began to see less and less of them. Today, noir movies are pretty few and far between. We get a few good ones every once in a great while (“L.A. Confidential”), but for the most part, noir today is a pale imitation of what it was (“Gangster Squad”). The sparseness of noir films of the modern era might be one of the things that make “Chinatown” stick out as much as it does. The 1970s were long removed from the flood of noir during years past, and Polanski seems to use that to his advantage.
While “Chinatown” has an undoubtedly grim outlook on life, the way that it looks at the 1930s setting is almost nostalgic. The grittiness of the world when looked at through Polanski’s nostalgic filter creates a film landscape unlike many others. The tone and outlook set in this film perfectly captures the feeling of noir greats, and J.J. Gittes (Nicholson, “The Passenger”) is just as compelling as Philip Marlowe (“The Big Sleep”). “Chinatown” might have arrived thirty years past the primetime of noir films, but it still is one of the best of the genre.
“Forget it, Jake. It’s Chinatown.”
Jake Gittes (Nicholson), a private investigator living in 1930s Los Angeles, finds his life complicated when he takes on a new case involving Hollis Mulwray (Darrell Zwerling, “Grease”) and his wife Evelyn (Faye Dunaway, “Barfly”), Noah Cross (John Huston, “The Other Side of the Wind”), and the drought that has settled over the county.
I think one of the things that works best in this film is the subtle way in which Polanski builds not only the world, but also the characters of that world. When we first arrive in LA, the drought has really sunk its fangs into the country and drained life from the landscape; everything just feels arid and oppressively hot. On top of that, we establish that our protagonist, Jake, is a private eye that specializes in adultery cases, and that sort of work doesn’t usually end with happy customers (the first scene of this film has a full-grown man breaking down in Jakes office, and that sort of sets the tone for the whole film). This is a desperate town filled with desperate people who are all on the verge of a breakdown, and that desperation is felt in almost every frame.
Jake himself is one of the better noir protagonists, because while he might fit some of the detective tropes, he also makes the role his own. One of the main things that make Jake interesting is the journey he takes a character. When we first meet Jake, he doesn’t seem particularly content in his work; he seems to be doing it just to make ends meet. But as the film goes on, we watch as Jake’s casual approach to his job falls away, and he frantically scrambles to find out what happens. Watching Jake shift from an uncaring and distant detective to a detective so personally involved in the case not only makes him a thrilling character, it makes the ending so much more intense and tragic.
Another thing I really like about this film is that nothing really feels forced as far as storyline. I’ve read my fair share of mystery novels and seen more than my fair share of mystery movies, and it always bugs me how many overly coincidental moments play into the detective (or protagonist) solving the mystery. Even in some of Polanski’s other works, I’ve taken issue with the way some revelations are handled. For example, in “The Ghost Writer”, there’s a scene where the protagonist (played by Ewan McGregor) gets information only because he gets caught on the other side of an island during a rainstorm and he just happens to stop at a house where a character saw some vital information and was willing to relay it to the protagonist. That whole scene felt incredibly coincidental, yet the film wouldn’t have worked without it. “Chinatown” doesn’t really have any of those moments; instead, the script is drum-tight. Jake consistently makes smart decisions based on the knowledge he was given. He never really makes great leaps to conclusions, nor does he withhold information to make a great sweeping revelation at the end. We, as the viewer, know only as much as Jake knows at any given time, so we feel like we’re solving this case with Jake.
Our three leads, Nicholson, Dunaway, and Huston are all amazing as far as acting goes. I’ve already mentioned how the character’s arc is what makes Jake an interesting character, but Nicholson himself is totally captivating in the role. Dunaway is absolutely astounding as Evelyn Mulwray. She is perhaps the most complex character in the film, and watching Jake sift through the layers of her personality to find out whom she is really is one of the of the driving forces of the film. Huston is one of the Hollywood Golden Era greats. Whether he was directing, acting, writing, it didn’t seem to matter; he mastered it all (he was nominated for fifteen Oscars and won two). He steals a couple of scenes in this film, including one of the most important ones.
Verdict:
Without going into any details, just know that the last scene of this film is the scene that solidifies its greatness. The ending sells the bleakness of the themes and world in a way that feels tragic but totally unavoidable. No matter what Jake did, the film was always going to end the way that it did, and that really emphasizes the hopelessness of the world that Polanski has so carefully crafted. It might not be a happy film (this is Polanski we’re talking about- he doesn’t have many happy films), but it is a brilliant representation of the noir genre, and one of the most memorable detective films of all time.
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