Widening Horizons - Chinatown

Overlooked. Forgotten. Pot-a-to, pot-aa-to. Yes, it is often the fate of old films to be forgotten by the vast majority despite universal critical acclaim, awards, box office success, selection into the United States National Film Registry, being ranked second among mystery films by the American Film Institute, and above all, being used in film schools all around the world as an example of the ideal screenplay in the mystery genre.

I realised that this film was forgotten, even by film buffs, due to the recent addictive Facebook trend on the Indian Film Hub, i.e, #ExplainFilmPlotBadly. Unable to live with this, I vowed that my next entry would be about this Roman Polanski film that put the neo before noir by breaking so many rules of the genre and thereby reinventing it.

To use the word 'economical' for Robert Towne's screenplay would be to shortchange it. 'Rich' would be closer to the mark, as almost every scene in the film is completely saturated with details of a highly complex plot as well as necessary character exposition, all done without resorting to clichés of a genre that had been done to death in Hollywood.

The protagonist, J J Gittes (Jack Nicholson), is the quintessential classical noir anti-hero - a private detective with a dark past, quick with a snarky reply, and too clever for his own good. It could easily have been a character that was just a stereotype, but certain traits, such as his huge ego and meddlesome nature, along with a past that is very cleverly designed, make him the ideal protagonist for this story.

One of the most unique things about this film is that despite being a multi-layered mystery, it is actually driven by character and not plot. Gittes is a private detective, and not bound in any way to try to solve the mystery before him, but it is his pride and inquisitiveness that lead him headfirst into a web of lies, corruption, insatiable greed, and unspeakable evil that knows no bounds.

The second most important character of the film is Evelyn Mulwray (Faye Dunaway). Based on the femme fatale archetype, Evelyn's character is designed to serve as a catalyst of sorts, as it is the equation between her and Gittes that makes events unfold as they do. Gittes will not rest until he has discovered the truth, because his pride has been wounded, but Evelyn has a secret so dark that she cannot let him discover it.

Evelyn's internal conflict is that she wants Gittes to find her husband's killer, but not discover her secret. He is the only one who can help her, but she cannot bring herself to trust him completely. They're effectively joined at the hip, but Gittes' past and his nature do not allow him to trust her either, leading to a relationship that is almost certain to end in tragedy.

There is also the character of Evelyn's husband, Hollis Mulwray. Despite very little screen time, his character is crucial, not only because it lies at the centre of the plot, but also because of its thematic importance. From what we come to know of him, Mulwray shines like a beacon of light in a dark world and is extinguished, a reflection of the harsh truth that in the real world, good does not stand a chance against evil, a foreshadow of the story's tragic end.

That anyone who likes mystery films should watch Chinatown is a given, because it has one of the most exquisitely crafted, complex plots that one would ever see. There is hardly a scene that does not provide a clue that takes Gittes, and therefore us, one step closer to the truth. That is not all though, since a lot of these scenes also contain hints about the second layer of the mystery, subtly yet surely setting up one of the most shocking twists of all time.

This second layer, revealed in the twist at the end of the second act, is what makes Chinatown Chinatown. Countless noir films centre around single layered mysteries which have the entire focus of the viewer, and therefore do not have the potential to shake you to your core no matter how well they've been made. This is why the inclusion of the second layer in Chinatown is a stroke of pure genius, and if not for The Sixth Sense that came out a couple of decades later, it would've been remembered as the greatest twist in the history of cinema.

The twist is a linchpin that serves a myriad of purposes in the plot, only one of which is to leave the viewer flabbergasted. It adds an edge to three of the four key characters, providing almost unquestionable motives for their actions so that the plot never seems contrived, something that is almost impossible to achieve in this genre. To the film's antagonist it gives a dual motive, while to Evelyn it gives conflicting motives, making her one of the most well designed characters in the genre.

With the plot and characters in place, Towne and Polanski add a few innovative touches to make the film look more realistic. Be it nifty little detective tricks, or the bold move of having the protagonist's nose awkwardly bandaged for half the film (unheard of in those days, due to the egos of big stars fixated on projecting a certain image). The biggest innovation however, was to set most of the film in the day, as opposed to the night setting typical of classical noir.

One of Towne's greatest achievements in this film is designing a character tailor-made for Jack Nicholson, so that he does not have to act much. Faye Dunaway, on the other hand, deserves almost half the credit for making the film's twist work, because it is her fantastic performance that sets it up more than anything else. Truly, her performance is a masterclass in getting into the skin of an extremely conflicted character on which rests the success of the entire film.

Forty years after its release, Chinatown's screenplay is still regarded as one of the best in the history of cinema, and as close to flawless as they get. It holds up even under the most powerful of microscopes, and is one of those rare films that gets better and better under intense analysis. In an age where every story in every genre has been retold a hundred times, Chinatown still shows you something you haven't seen before, and this statement will probably be true for a long, long time.