Available at Amazon.com
Director
Roman Polanski
Cast
Jack Nicholson ……. J.J. ‘Jake’ Gittes
Faye Dunaway ……. Evelyn Cross Mulwray
John Huston ……. Noah Cross
Perry Lopez ……. Lieutenant Lou Escobar
John Hillerman ……. Russ Yelburton
Darrell Zwerling ……. Hollis I. Mulwray
Diane Ladd ……. Ida Sessions
Roy Jenson ……. Claude Mulvihill
The Movie
Before Roman Polanski fled the country after becoming a convicted pedophile, he crafted two of the 1970s greatest films. The first was Rosemary’s Baby, a psychological thriller about the devil impregnating a woman. The other was Chinatown, a noir piece that was intended to be the first part of a detective trilogy.
Jack Nicholson stars as Jake Gittes, a detective hired for what seems like a straightforward case. Evelyn (Faye Dunaway) suspects her husband is cheating on her and hires Jake to follow him. From there he falls into a conspiracy involving government malfeasance and corrupt officials, leading back to Chinatown itself.
Chinatown has remained a classic of the years because of several things. It has a tight story and a steady pace; nothing is rushed. Polanski has crafted a detective thriller that holds up with the best of the Bogart-era classics. There isn’t any nuance to the film that hasn’t already been before, so it’s a bit derivative of the genre, but it’s perhaps one of the best representations of it so it’s a forgivable cinematic sin. It’s so good that sticking to a formula for the bulk of its two hour running time doesn’t hurt it.
The trick is that the film’s finale doesn’t give the requisite happy ending to the proceedings. It’s gritty and somewhat depressing, as opposed to seeing Gittes walk away in the sunset, but it fits. A happier ending would ruin a lot of the good will the film builds by trying to send us home happy, as opposed to being the proper conclusion, and is one of the films Hollywood doesn’t make anymore. It’s part of why the film’s so good; the 1970s were the “Golden Era” of Hollywood film-making in terms of story-telling and a film like this couldn’t be made now. Polanski’s direction and Nicholson’s off-key acting style would never be allowed.
Polanski and Nicholson have never been better, but that’s for a reason. This was in the age before Nicholson’s acting style consisted more of sneers and yelling, as Gittes is a guy who gets to the heart of things without feeling the urge to scream every 20 seconds. It’s an interesting, nuanced performance from Nicholson that would help him become one of the biggest actors of his generation. Polanski was at his peak, never really achieving anywhere near the heights of this film in terms of combining great story-telling and great acting.
A/V QUALITY CONTROL
Presented in a Dolby Digital 5.1 format with a widescreen presentation, the film has had it’s a/v presentation enhanced from its initial release. While it isn’t a substantial upgrade, the film’s score is a bit more booming and the picture a bit sharper from before.
The Extras
Chinatown: The Beginning and The End is a retrospective piece on the film featuring all the big names from it. Nicholson, Polanski and writer Robert Towne talk about the origins of the film’s creation. Originally conceived as a trilogy featuring Gittes spaced out in real time, i.e. The Two Jakes follows Chinatown in both chronological order as well as the 16 years between them aged the series from 1932 to 1948. It’s a fascinating 20 minute piece about the film’s production, from the finish that was barely written when production started to the process by which the film found its story.
Chinatown: Filming focuses on some of the film’s cinematography and memorable scenes, running around 25 minutes or so, with the same group as before talking about the film.
Chinatown: The Legacy looks at the film’s legacy. Much shorter than the other features at under 10 minutes, it looks at Nicholson and the crew discussing the critical praising of the film and how they never got the backlash they were expecting against it because it was so well received.
The film’s Theatrical Trailer is included as well.
