Brilliant Modern Noir

Rating: 10/10 (27 February 2002)

Film noir doesn't get any better than this. Gone are the cookie cutter cliches that litter the less imaginative of the genre. Instead, we have a film propelled by a rare depth, attention to detail, and desire for realism. Thanks to the more permissive cultural environment surrounding filmmaking in the 1970s, we get a movie of haunting power which would be as impossible to make today as it would have been in the 40s.
All the elements of classic film noir are present. We have a tough, gritty private detective. On the outside, he's a cold man. But we sense a great weight on his shoulders, and in the end we see that he is motivated more than he lets on by heroic qualities hidden in his own nature. We have a beautiful, mysterious, and quite possibly dangerous "femme fatale". We have a convoluted plot, which seems to kick off simply enough, but soon spirals out of all control. We have color photography.
Wait a minute? Black and white photography is a staple of film noir! How you have film noir in color? I don't know, but it works. The film has a kind of dry, parched look to it. The colors are very dull and muted. Everything is sort of drab and brown. It's a wonderful look, and it's essential to the ambience of the film.
But what really makes this stand out from the crowd is the realism of the story. J. J. Gittes is a far more real character than Phillip Marlowe or Sam Spade. Like those who came before him, Gittes has a casual, relaxed demeanor, a sharp sense of humor, and a no-nonsense tough-guy persona. But he's not half as slick as those others. His dialogue, every bit as colorful as Marlowe's or Spade's, has far less of the Hollywood polish and wit to it.

The story is really remarkable. Of course, the censors would have gone insane over this script back in the 40s. I mean, not only is it a lot too sexually explicit, but the ending is all wrong. This is what makes "Chinatown" such a great film in its own right, and not just another modern homage to great films of the past. It takes full advantage of the tenor of the times to create a story that couldn't have been done before.

The story is very complex and challenges the viewer to connect their own dots. The big picture is easy enough to understand, but the details are easy to overlook. Fortunately, "Chinatown" stays focused on the story, and never lets the stars get in the way.
I'm shocked to see people disapproving of the ending of this film. I'm even more shocked to see that scriptwriter Bob Towne disagreed with Polanski over it during the production of the film. How could this film end any differently? The whole thing is constantly building up this idea of Chinatown, where the best thing to do is as little as possible. In order for the film to hang together, to stay true to its thematic core, there must be a tragic ending. This isn't Roman Polanski shooting a dark film to fit his dark mood, this is a capable and astute director filming the only ending that matters. If the film had ended the other way, you could still say it was a very good film. I mean, the cast would still be uniformly excellent. The story would still be fascinating and shocking. The cinematography would have been the same. But it's heart would have been cut out. And it could never have been the classic that is today.
This is one of the very best films ever made.