Chinatown – Classic Film Review
An Immortal Hollywood Classic That Enthralls Modern Audiences
Sep 26, 2009
Since its release in 1974, Chinatown – directed by Roman Polanski, from an original script written by Robert Towne – has often been classified as film noir, a genre that became popular in the Hollywood of the 1940s. While it starts out like a classic detective story that seems to revolve around two of the most common character types identified with film noir – the private investigator and the femme fatale – Chinatown defies its original label and reinvents mystery, taking the viewer into a totally unexpected direction.
Inevitability and Surprise in Chinatown
Everything that seems to be important in the opening scenes of the film turns out to be just a diversion from the real story, whereas what appear to be disparate, meaningless images become clues to the drama unfolding as the film progresses. Chinatown is a skillfully crafted mystery, infused with just the right amount of inevitability which propels the story forward at an energetic pace.
The hero of the story, Jake Gittes (Jack Nicholson), is a private investigator who collects evidence of marital infidelity. When a Mrs. Mulwray (Diane Ladd) hires him to follow her husband, the L.A. Water Commissioner Hollis Mulwray (Darrell Zwerling), who is allegedly having an affair, the detective stumbles upon a complicated mystery. Gittes does what his employer asks of him, but when the pictures that he had taken of Hollis Mulwray are published in a newspaper, attracting negative publicity, the real Evelyn Mulwray (Faye Dunaway) shows up, threatening to sue him. It is at that moment that Gittes realizes somebody has used him and decides to get to the bottom of it. However, he soon realizes that he is dealing with something far more complicated than he had imagined when Mulwray, who was opposing the construction of a dam meant to supply the city with water in the midst of a drought, is found dead. The investigation takes Gittes back to Evelyn Mulwray and to her shady father, Noah Cross (John Huston), the mastermind behind the water scheme, who eventually proves to be Mulwray’s killer.
The story makes its debut as an inoffensive, amusing even, hunt for adulterers, but it quickly becomes a tale of conspiracy and eventually a profound human tragedy. With every twist and turn, Chinatown changes its shape, forcing the viewer to keep up with its alert rhythm.
The Human Factor
However clever the idea behind the plot of Chinatown, it is the characters who breathe life into the story, who make the plot function and deliver its message. Through their work, the writer and the actors have managed to transform the archetypal private eye and femme fatale into realistic characters, into vulnerable people living in a complicated reality, thus deconstructing the cliché of these infallible types as seen in so many detective stories preceding Chinatown.
Jack Nicholson gives a strong, moving performance as Jake Gittes, the cynical and apparently careless private detective. Despite his tough-guy allure, the audience discovers his vulnerability when they least expect it. Unlike his predecessors, this private eye does care about others and he lives his life by a series of self-established moral conventions. He has a past – as a cop in Chinatown – that haunts him and that he hides from most people, a backstory that humanizes him.
Equally intriguing is the character of Evelyn Mulwray, who is wrapped in the illusion of a controlled, self-assured woman, but who, as she moves the story forward, becomes vulnerable, and is eventually the central tragic figure of the story.
John Huston plays the cunning Noah Cross with an impenetrable expression on his face, which dramatically contrasts with his polished manners and the relaxed atmosphere that surrounds the millionaire.
Produced in a period of time when Hollywood films relied more on its actors’ interpretation ability than on the power of images to deliver the story, Chinatown excels in the humanity and the intensity of its scenes.
The Atmosphere of Chinatown
The setting and the images of Polanski’s film, evoking a long-lost L.A., where dreams still coexisted with the grim reality of neighborhoods like Chinatown, contribute to the poignant tone of the story. So does Jerry Goldsmith’s dreamy, ethereal score, whose notes underline every state this movie induces in its audience, from suspense to meditation. As the scenes move forward, the lonely trumpet solo warns about the pain and disillusion that hides behind the apparent glamour of the Mulwrays’ life.
Chinatown, which displays an impressive image integrity, is built around two visual metaphors. Water is one of the recurring metaphors in the story, and its presence – or absence – in various images underlines the tragedy of a shore town plagued by drought and that of a family looking for answers in all the wrong places. The desolate neighborhood of Chinatown, which gives the film its title, is the other visual metaphor that holds this construction together. Chinatown is the place where no crime is accounted for, where loss is part of daily life. It is no coincidence that the bleakness of Chinatown is the setting where, at the end of the story, Jake Gittes loses everything that he cares about.
Year released: 1974
- Distributed by: Paramount Pictures
- Directed by: Roman Polanski
- Written by: Robert Towne
- Runtime: 131 minutes
