Chinatown (1974) | The Film Index

Film Record

Chinatown

Country: United States
Release: 20 JUN 1974
Runtime: 130 min
Original Language: English

Community Rating

★★★★★

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Private eye Jake Gittes lives off of the murky moral climate of sunbaked, pre-World War II Southern California. Hired by a beautiful socialite to investigate her husband's extra-marital affair, Gittes is swept into a maelstrom of double dealings and deadly deceits, uncovering a web of personal and political scandals that come crashing together.

Why It's Here

The flawless execution of the revisionist neo-noir. Robert Towne’s screenplay is famously taught in every screenwriting class as the perfect structural paradigm, while Roman Polanski’s direction subverts the traditional noir hero by making his detective utterly impotent against systemic corruption.

What to Watch For: The visual framing of water (or the lack thereof), which serves as both the literal plot engine and a metaphor for wealth and power. Watch how the film strictly adheres to Jake Gittes’s point of view; the audience never learns a piece of information before he does, trapping us in his flawed perspective.

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Chinatown

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