Chinatown

Rating: 10/10 (24 April 2013)

Roman Polanski's "Chinatown" is one of the greatest films of the 1970s for a couple of reasons:
Firstly, it stars two of New Hollywood's biggest actors, Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway, in the leading roles. Dunaway played Bonnie Parker, the infamous bank robber, in Arthur Penn's "Bonnie and Clyde", a film that hearkened back to the gangster films of the thirties. Nicholson starred in "Easy Rider" (1969) and "Five Easy Pieces" (1970), two central films in the counterculture movement of the sixties that also cemented his status as a A-list star. These two actors have perfect chemistry on screen.
Secondly, in the same way "Bonnie and Clyde" was molded after classic gangster films, "Chinatown" is modeled after film noirs of the forties and fifties. Nicholson plays Private Investigator Jack Gittes, a man whose job it is to spy on other peoples' social lives. This theme of voyeurism is consistent throughout the film, from the opening scene where one of Gittes' customers looks at photos that Gittes has taken of his wife with another man, to later shots of Gittes spying on a man from faraway through binoculars. The lens of the binoculars forms the frame. In scenes such as this, Polanski uses depth within the frame much the same as film noir utilized lighting. In many scenes throughout the film, the camera is placed far back from the characters and the action to create a feeling of suspense. This is what the old film noirs would have looked like in color.
Nicholson's character in "Chinatown" is an embodiment of the troubled male hero in countless film noirs. Something that happened in his past as a cop working in Chinatown haunts him day and night; he isn't comfortable talking about it. Chinatown itself is an enigmatic place that represents Gittes past, and it back to Chinatown where the story ultimately takes him. All of this aside, the film's story is an ingenious mystery that will have anyone holding their breath until the very last moments.