Chinatown (1974)

Good start, but then it gets ruined

There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Chinatown is a slow moving film but it shouldn't deter you from seeing it. The screenplay by Robert Towne is considered the template for all screenplays and it is incredibly rich n everything a script should be. Polanski is a master so there's no point covering that bit and the way he executes each scene is amazing. Nicholson and Dunaway are awesome and make a great pair. The cinematography is amazing and Los Angeles 1930's never looked this good. This is a film that should be taught in film schools on how to make a great film.

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

Renowned for its stylised performances, artful direction and riveting story telling technique, Roman Polanski's Chinatown captures a bygone era of crime drama. Jack Nicholson (in an Academy Award nominated performance) is Jack Gittes, a wisecracking private eye who makes "an honest living" off the murky moral climate of pre-war Los Angeles. Hired by a beautiful socialite (Faye Dunaway) to look into her husband's extramarital affair, Gittes unknowingly stumbles across a web of double-dealings and deceit. What at first appears to be an open-and-shut case unravels right under Gitte's nose to expose a maelstrom of political scandal, widespread corruption and dark family secrets that all come to light, one night in Chinatown.Winner of the Academy Award and BAFTA for Best Original Screenplay, this ground-breaking film also garnered 11 Academy Award nominations in all (including Best Picture, Best Actor, and Best Director). Chinatown is a landmark achievement in the classic film noir tradition, cementing its place as a cornerstone in every movie aficionado's collections.After reading through the blurb and writing down the information, I turn over the DVD case and can't help but thinking that this is one of the best films I've ever seen in a long, long time. Its place amongst the best Noir pictures is well deserved. One would argue that Noir cinema had its time in the 30s or 40s but was later tailed off by the arrival of more market-driven movies. Chinatown meets the criteria of any movie that wants to qualify as Noir: twist and turns, a touch of violence, a solid and rich plot that slowly diverges into several, an inquisitive, witty and cynic detective; someone who Raymond Chandler would be very proud of, characters well outlined whose loyalties slowly but surely are forcing them into witching alliances...and so many more. Yet, what has granted Chinatown a place of its own in cinema history is the changes it brought to the genre. Indeed, here what starts the plot off isn't gambling or a bereaved mistress but a water supply scandal and its cover-up in Los Angeles; there isn't either a femme fatale, although there's romance involved and the ending of the movie is one to remember. It's been rubber-stamped in my memory and It'll never go away. Not that I want it to.

*NO SPOILER YET* In case you're wondering why the incredibly high ratings, bear in mind this is a Polanski (all the cinema lovers, "intellectuals" and critics' favorite) starring now classic Jack Nicholson in a typical film noir that takes itself so very seriously it's almost telling you you have to love it or else you're not a true cinema purist.To be honest, Nicholson as the other actors put in a good performance. Dunaway is alright but not nearly brilliant, but anyways the point is even incredibly talented actors couldn't make mediocrity into greatness. The script is fine if you're a fanatic of crime films, but if you just so happen not to be particularly this is the slowest 2hrs10min you've seen in a long time. In a long time. The pacing is S-L-O-W, you couldn't quite call this piece exactly "stimulating". The very plot is completely ordinary - big powerful bad guy covers up his horrible crimes and wants more money more power, complicated story about L.A.'s water and who owns it (wow no fascinating) - and has no edge to it whatsoever for the genre. What is considered "superb structure" can just as easily feel like a ton of events that pile up and further sinks the film into a delirium of enduring boredom where instead of being uneventful, it is full of stuff happening, but all of which are dull and typical.What's more, there's nothing else about the film that helps lift the bland quality of the whole: dialog has no particular wit and also subscribes to the typical formula, the humor is corny, there's no real moral or actual greater point, the emotional dimension is fake and cold, the cinematography is flat and linear, and there isn't even that big old ending at the end that could've perhaps given legitimacy to the darn thing.*SPOILER* - the Dunaway mother/sister thing is ridiculous and unnecessary and brings no strength to the plot, the fact she dies in the end right in front of that poor traumatized kid is senseless and also with no worth, how it's strongly implied the grandfather wants to sexually abuse her too and grabs her and takes her away is just insanely unnecessary and anti-climactic. And the clues towards the end are technically ridiculous: so of all places he drowns the guy in his pool in his backyard (conveniently the only place with salt water in the whole entire perimeter), of course drops his glasses in there and in order to read that paper at the end he pulls out and wears the exact same pair...Lots of flaws there. You can like it and all, but the flaws are certainly there.