Chinatown (1974)

Slow pace in the most part of the movie.

Admirable film.

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Every movie lover knows about the brilliance of Roman Polanski's "Chinatown". If you are reading these reviews you havent seen it yet, which positions you in a place at the gates of heaven. You have not entered heaven yet, but you will once you decide to walk through the gates and watch "Chinatown". I am rather jealous of you, because the first time is special, although the great thing about movies is, that the most wonderful stories CAN be relived time and again. "Chinatown¨ is up there with the all time greatest movies of american cinema history. The absolute pinnacle of genius.That must be enough praise to get you curious. My real advice would be not to read any further. Not my review, nor anyone elses. I just wanted to make sure with my first paragraph that you wont make the unforgivable mistake of passing this movie by. You havent lived without having seen it...The story takes place in L.A. in the thirties, in the middle of a period of drought there is a big conflict about how to get more water to the city. A previous water reservoir had collapsed and killed 500 innocent L.A. citizens and now they plan to built another one with the same faults that were present in the earlier disaster. Enter Jack Nicholson as a private investigator who at first gets an assignment that seemingly has nothing to do at all with this disaster which cost so many people's lives. He just has to research if a husband is cheating on his wife. What seems an innocent and tedious job, soon becomes a life threatening case, when Jack Nicholson finds out more than he is supposed to know about the powers that be, that want to build this risky dam, come hell or high water...The story truly is very intelligent, suspenseful and emotionally devastating and has won many awards. The number of awards is mindboggling so I wont start listing them here, but it suffices to say that everything, and I truly mean everything, could be and has been awarded about this movie. I just want to restrain myself, in order to limit the length of this review. No I cant. I just GOT TO mention everything. I'll keep it "short". The acting. Let's start with that. Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway and John Huston truly play the roles of their lives. Images so pure and intense that I can see them by just mentioning the name "Chinatown". The photography by John A. Alonzo (Scarface) is breathtaking. Almost every scene is shot in the magic hours, when the sun rises or sets and delivers shadows and golden colors that only last for some 30 minutes every day. All the images are bathing in this glow of early sunset. Almost every scene could be a poster, that is how gorgeous the photography is. Finally the music score by Jerry Goldsmith, who is a music genius. With a minimum of instruments he creates another "leading role", because his music is intertwined with the heart of this movie. Yes, his music score is so powerful and sublime that it is unimaginable to think of "Chinatown" without these dissonant piano string chords and gorgeous dreamlike trumpet themes. Jerry Goldsmith's music scores are even being used after his passing, every year till this very day, movies are released with themes from earlier scores by this brilliant composer.In the end we have to thank Director Roman Polanski for his genius in bringing all these talents together and creating something which will be seen by generations to come. In a time capsule of movie history Roman Polanski's masterpiece will shine as a star among the very greatest that american cinema has ever achieved.

Rarely is a film, rarely is a screenplay so flawless and excellent as it is in Roman Polanski's Chinatown. From the first shot, up to the ending. And my god, what an ending. Along with the Reunion from Shawshank, I can't remember a better, more fitting, touching, yet even disturbing film ending. Chinatown is one of the most wonderfully acted, ingeniously clever written and excellently directed films of all time. A classic for all ages: 10/10

Film Review: "Chinatown" (1974)Character J.J. Gittes, the private eye for tricky matrimonial cases with the usual "inflagranti" finish note to a case, performed to picture-carrying excellence by actor Jack Nicholson at age 36, trusting director Roman Polanksi, at the height of his powers in Hollywood, to wear two third of the film bandaid noise after investigations get all-too-messy concerning a major struggle for the water-supply dominion in Los Angeles county.Producer Robert Evans, in close excutive action with legendary as prestigious Hollywood Major Studio "Paramount Pictures", opens doors for director Roman Polanski, who gets filmmaking freedoms to find classic 1940s hard-boiled film noir homages, when screenwriter Robert Towne's Academy-Award-given original script out of total eleven nominations at the Oscars on April 8th 1975 in its 47th edition, losing all major categories to equal as comparable "The Godfather: Part II" starring Al Pacino and Robert De Niro as Young Vito Corleone directed by Academy-Award-winning Francis Ford Coppola.Nevertheless "Chinatown" strikes an even darker note than its direct competitor, when street-thug-behavior gets respectable due to the shear non-stop endurance and elevated to excellence impersonated by haunting as impeccably-written character of "Noah Cross", portrayed in fine-beat-acting by highly-successful director in his own right John Huston (1906-1987), who shares the highest suspense moments with Jack Nicholson getting seemingly sucked deeper into L.A.'s underworld of contract-making, funds-shifting with iron-fist for the so-called "Future" of mankind with running water in an unless desert city. Director Roman Polanski makes sure that the 125-Minute-Editorial does not fail once to lose its grip onto the audience with additional atmospheric scoring by supreme composer Jerry Goldsmith (1929-2004) and supporting grace and classic-beauty-indulging actress Faye Dunaway as notorious character Evelyn Mulwray, who carries a family that deep hiding in female's spirit that every scene she appears becomes unbearable for tension points that have not been done better in Hollywood-filmmaking ever since.Copyright 2018 Cinemajesty Entertainments LLC

Just like the plot within, this film is deceptive. You go into it thinking that you'll get just another crime drama, and from the beginning it feels like one. Then you see Hollis Mulwray dead in the reservoir, and all of a sudden it feels like you've gotten a body shot from boxing legend Joe Frazier. The rest of the film is more of a boxing match between you and the film. You think you've got it figured out, you think you're starting to get some shots on it, but then it gives you another body shot that throws all your conceptions out the window.And the film never lets up, it just keeps going and going and going. The conspiracy and plot gets thicker and deeper, thicker and deeper. Is it Cross? Is is the real Mrs. Mulwray? The only form of relief, of closure you get from the film is from a scene where Mrs. Mulwray describes a girl who she's keeping away from everyone else as both her "daughter and sister" - I'll let you do the math yourself on that one. I personally don't want to think about it.Not even the end provides closure. Just as you've started to hope for Mrs. Mulwray and start to relax knowing she's gotten away from a seemingly mentally deranged Mr. Cross, a pistol report rings out and the horn of her car starts to sound."Forget about it, it's Chinatown" Jake Gittes is told by his partner as they walk away into the darkness of the night. After seeing the debauchery, the conspiracy, and the crime present in the film, it's almost like he's inviting the audience to "forget about it" as well.