One of Five of the Best Nicholson Movies!

Rating: Null/10 (11 March 2003)

CHINATOWN(1974), ****1/2 out of 5. Starring Jack Nicholson, Faye Dunaway, John Huston, Perry Lopez, John Hillerman, Darrell Zwerling, Diane Ladd, Roy Jenson, Roman Polanski, James Hong, and Burt Young as Curly.
A wonderfully brooding, suspenseful revisitation of the land of film noir, CHINATOWN is not only one of the greatest detective films, but one of the most perfectly constructed of all films. With Polanski's brilliant direction, Towne's intricate screenplay, and Nicholson's and Dunaway's tour de force performances, the film stands as one of the best of the 1970s. The plot revolves around Gittes (Nicholson), a Chandleresque private eye who specializes in the most distasteful of detective enterprises--snooping after straying spouses. After being duped by a woman pretending to be the wife of the city water commissioner, Gittes meets the man's real wife, Evelyn Mulwray (Dunaway), but before long she ends up a widow. Drawn into these strange goings-on, Gittes follows a jigsaw puzzle of clues that leads to Mulwray's father, Cross (Huston). Cross has involved himself in the "future" of Los Angeles by engineering a plot to divert the city's water supply for his own gain.
Besides telling a gripping story involving incest and political graft, CHINATOWN recaptures the atmosphere of Los Angeles, 1937--the cars, clothes, and buildings, right down to the barber chairs (kudos to production designer Richard Sylbert and costumer Anthea Sylbert). Even the muted color cinematography (normally antithetical to the tenets of noir) is evocative and apppropriate. Interestingly, Towne's script included not a single scene set in Chinatown--initially a metaphorical state of mind rather than a specific place.
Look for director Polanski as the thug who pokes a switchblade up Nicholson's nostril while uttering the infamous line, "You know what happens to nosy fellows? They lose their noses." Another highlight: Dunaway's "sister... daughter... sister... daughter" routine, a camp classic much parodied since. CHINATOWN earned 11 Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, but only Towne took home a statuette for his cynical screenplay.