Chinatown

The more I see "Chinatown", the more I like it, it used to be my second favorite Roman Polanski film after "Repulsion", but after viewing it again, I have to say for me, I join the masses and regard it as his masterpieces. Polanski has made many great films, but this for my money is his greatest, and perhaps one of the greatest of all films.

"Chinatown", is a modern film noir, it was made in the glorious decade of the 70s when people who ran studios still loved making movies, it starred Jack Nicholson, a man who was arguably the greatest actor of his generation, it was written by his friend Robert Towne, a script that is still talked about today as one of the greatest ever written. It was produced by Robert Evans, a man who owned paramount and was also responsible for "The Godfather". Lastly there was Polanski, a European filmmaker who Evans thought was ideal this type of material and he was correct.

"Chinatown" isn't only a wonderfully entertaining picture, it's a metaphor for evil, it's multi layered in a labyrinth plot that enhances with each viewing, it's got an old fashioned view of film noir, yet it's entirely modern.

The film for those of you who don't know has to do with water and Los Angeles, yet it begins with a case of infidelity. Nicholson plays Jake Gittes, a private eye who mostly makes a living as a man who takes pictures of spouses having extra-marital affairs; It's not glamorous, but it's an honest living. Jake is hired by Evelyn Mulray (Diane Ladd) who's husband is cheating on her, her husband also happens to be the water commissioner for Los Angeles. Jake sees the husband with another woman and the pictures are leaked. Soon Jake meets the real Evelyn Mulray (Faye Dunaway) who never hired him to take these pictures. Jake realizes he's been duped by someone and he wants to find out why. The plot leads to the water commissioner being murdered, and finding out that L.A.'s water is being rerouted without anyone knowing. The mastermind behind this is Noah Cross (John Huston) who also happens to be Evelyn's father. Both Cross and Evelyn aren't telling Jake the full truth, yet as his investigation digs deeper, we like Jake are just as surprised by what this all leads to.

"Chinatown" was directed like most Private Eye movies, we as the audience are following Jake, he is our way into the mystery that is being unraveled, we know what he knows, it's only at the end do we realize how far behind Jake was with the whole investigation, it all comes down to one of the most shocking and horrifying climaxes in film history, one that Polanski had to fight for to put into the script.

Like with all great movies, the more you watch it, the more things I picked up on, I always found Nicholson's performance great, Jake Gittes is one of his greatest screen performances, but this time I was stunned by how wonderful Faye Dunaway was. Dunaway is a bundle of nerves throughout the film, she's unwinding as the plot is unfolding, you know she is hiding something, but you don't know, by the end she's a neurotic mess, but by that time we understand, she goes from femme fatale in her opening scene, to a delicate tragic figure, her performance is as mysterious as the film itself.

Of course credit should be given to Robert Towne for writing what many call a perfect screenplay, he had the ingenious idea of incorporating water into the mystery, whoever owns L.A.'s water, owns L.A. The city lives at the edge of the dessert, and water is the life force of the film. The water motif comes up very often in the film from spewing out of a car that's been shot at, to a small salt water pond in a persons yard that becomes very important in the plot.

Polanski though seems to be in full control, a director who can be as controlling with shots and what the people see as well as Hitchcock, yet he tremendously economical, you don't really realize how long these shots go on because they are composed so well. Polanski gives us a Los Angeles that's both old and new, it's set in the 1940s when noir films were at its peak, but he updates those themes to a modern audience, he reveals the evil that film noir was getting at and illustrates it better than anyone.

It's important to view when Polanski filmed "Chinatown", it his first Hollywood film since the murder of his wife Sharon Tate by the Manson family, he has been long affected by that and perhaps still is. He was a child of the holocaust, he has seen evil come at first hand, I was a little critical of Polanski's last film "Ghost Writer", a film that ended so bleakly, almost as if Polanski had to make it bleak even if it didn't call for it. I now understand that it was probably me being too narrow minded of that film and of Polanski's point of view, of course he had to make it bleak, that was part of the whole film, that's what it leads too no matter how hard it is to take. It's the same in "Chinatown", yet it's even more shocking in this film because we are expecting at least a clean ending, but that's not how it should end, that's not what life is like all the time, and Polanski knew that. You can't really think of "Chinatown" with another ending than what it has now, I hate to think of it with another ending, and I think Polanski could hate to think of another one as well.

"Chinatown" is one of the great film noirs, perhaps the greatest, each time I think of it, it's more complex with its plot, its characters, and its motivations, it's also an entertaining film on its own, full of the great type of cynical humour known throughout film noir. "Chinatown" came at time when Hollywood studios still took chances on films, that time was brief but it was there, it's one of those films people still don't forget the impact it had back then and even now.