History Main / Chinatown

* The trope, FriendlyLittleChinatown.

* The [[Film/Chinatown film]].

[[redirect:Film/{{Chinatown}}]]

[[quoteright:181:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ChinatownPoster_1887.JPG]]

->'''Walsh:''' ''Forget it, Jake. It's Chinatown.''

One of the seminal Neo-Noir films, and considered by many to be among the best of FilmNoir films in general, ''Chinatown'' (1974) was written by Robert Towne and directed by RomanPolanski. The film stars JackNicholson, Faye Dunaway, and JohnHuston. It is ''[[WorldHalfEmpty DARK.]]''

''Chinatown'' tells the story of Jake Gittes, a former cop turned PrivateDetective living and working in 1937 Los Angeles. Gittes is hired by a woman claiming to be Evelyn Mulwray, the wife of the city's water commissioner to prove that her husband is having an affair. It seems like a simple enough job. But it isn't. The woman who hired him isn't the real Mrs. Mulwray. Then the water commissioner ends up dead and the real Mrs. Mulwray hires Gittes to find out what really happened. He may think he knows what he's dealing with. [[ItGotWorse But he doesn't.]]

Fun fact: ''Chinatown'' was co-financed by Bob Guccione, the publisher of ''Penthouse''. (That's right, the pornographic magazine.)

[[IThoughtItMeant For the kind of place]], see FriendlyLocalChinatown. Don't confuse this with ''BigTroubleInLittleChina'', however tempting it may be.

Had a lesser-known (and less well-regarded) sequel, ''TheTwoJakes'', directed by JackNicholson and released in 1990.
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!!This movie contains examples of:

* AffablyEvil: [[spoiler:Noah Cross]]
* AndThenWhat: Subverted - Jake attempts this with the villain. [[ItGotWorse It doesn't work.]]
--> '''Jake Gittes:''' I just wanna know what you're worth. More than 10 million?
--> '''Noah Cross:''' Oh my, yes!
--> '''Jake Gittes:''' Why are you doing it? How much better can you eat? What could you buy that you can't already afford?
--> '''Noah Cross:''' [[VisionaryVillain The future, Mr. Gittes! The future]].
* ArcWords: "As little as possible."
* BadCopIncompetentCop
* TheBadGuyWins
* BerserkButton: The orange grove workers knock Jake unconscious after he calls one of them a "dumb Okie".
* BlackAndGreyMorality: Almost everyone. Gittes' cynical assumption that everyone has an angle leads directly to the [[spoiler: demise of the only character in the film with any pure motives at all]].
* BrokenBird: [[spoiler:Evelyn Mulwray]]
* ChekhovsGun:
** 'Bad for glass'.
** Good GOD there are so many in this film! Let's see here, [[spoiler:Evelyn]] has a flaw in [[spoiler:her]] left eye, Jake shoots out the left taillight of [[spoiler:her]] car, the pair of glasses that Jake finds has the left lens broken... and so on and so on. Guess where [[spoiler: Evelyn]] eventually gets shot?
** Even the seemingly insignificant touch of Evelyn accidentally setting off the car horn by resting her head on the steering wheel comes back with a vengeance at the end, when [[spoiler: Jake (and the audience) know her fate even before seeing the carnage by the continuous sound of the car horn]].
** The script is so loaded with these that many consider it to be one of the most structurally perfect screenplays ever written, and it has a reputation for being taught in screenwriting classes. ''Nothing'' is superfluous in this movie.
* ChekhovsGunman: Jake's client in the opening scene.
* CigaretteOfAnxiety: Faye Dunaway gets so nervous that she lights a cigarette while her previous one is still burning.
* CorruptBureaucrat: Yelburton.
* CorruptCorporateExecutive: [[spoiler:Noah Cross]]
* CreatorBreakdown: Roman Polanski's pregnant wife was murdered by the Manson Family. He was also a Holocaust survivor. His bleak, bleak worldview led him to change Robert Towne's BittersweetEnding into a big ole DownerEnding. Robert Towne ultimately conceded that it made the movie better.
* CreatorCameo: Roman Polanski himself appears in the film as the short hoodlum with the knife who slices Jake's nose.
* CutHimselfShaving: Jake's response when Yelburton asks what happened to his nose.
* DeadpanSnarker: Jake Gittes
* DeliberateValuesDissonance: The characters' casual sexism/racism/antisemitism.
* DetectivePatsy: Jake's getting hired by "Mrs. Mulwray" is what sets the whole plot in motion.
* DownerEnding: One of the nastiest in cinema. Perhaps the most famous aspect of this film outside of TheReveal.
* EnforcedMethodActing: Jack Nicholson was genuinely nervous during the nose-cutting scene because the knife being used could actually have hurt him badly if not held correctly. In the end, Roman Polanski did the scene himself to get it right.
* EurekaMoment: [[spoiler: The salt water pond]] is what is 'bad for glass.'
* EverybodySmokes: Appropriate for the period. Lampshaded when Jake asks the coroner, Morty, how he's doing, to which Morty complains of a cough - puffing away all the while, [[HistoricalInJoke blissfully unaware of things like emphysema or lung cancer]].
* EvilSoundsDeep: Just ''listen'' to JohnHuston's voice.
** Screenwriter Robert Towne once expressed that Huston was the second best-cast actor in the film, next to JackNicholson. Huston's performance, he claimed, elevated Cross above the portrayal in the script and made him truly memorable.
* EyeScream
* FemmeFatale: Just about everyone thinks Evelyn Mulwray is one of these. [[spoiler:She is the exact opposite]].
* FilmNoir: Although it goes out of its way to subvert and lampshade many of the core tropes of the genre.
* FriendOnTheForce: Escobar is kind of a subversion of this.
* FriendlyLocalChinatown: Well, it's local at least.
* GenreDeconstruction: Critics such as John G. Cawelti have argued that the film is all about deconstructing the "myth" of FilmNoir and the HardboiledDetective. Gittes isn't a tough, emotionally detached private eye, but rather a vulnerable, flawed AntiHero. Evelyn ''isn't'' a FemmeFatale, but everyone assumes she is (in part because of the misogynistic value system underpinning 1930s California). And the villain is so rich, powerful and influential that Gittes is ultimately powerless to stop him or his conspiracy. And so on.
* GratuitousFrench: When Jake is in bed with Evelyn and speaks about his bad memories of Chinatown.
-->'''Evelyn:''' ''Cherchez la femme''.\\
'''Jake:''' (*looks back in blank incomprehension*)\\
'''Evelyn:''' Was there a woman involved?\\
'''Jake:''' Of course.
* GuileHero: While "hero" might be something of a stretch, the fact is that Jake is VERY good at making people slip up so he can wring info out of them, and has so many tricks up his sleeve he'd do {{Batman}} proud.
* HardboiledDetective
* HeroicBSOD: Gittes has one that is epic.
* ItGotWorse: SO MUCH WORSE.
* JapaneseRanguage: Actually a plot point.
* JustBetweenYouAndMe: "The future, Mr. Gittes. The future!"
* KarmaHoudini: By a CompleteMonster, no less.
* KnightInSourArmor
* MeaningfulName: "'''Holl'''is '''Mul'''wray" is derived from William '''Mulholl'''and, the name of one of the men involved in the real events which the film fictionalizes (see VeryLooselyBasedOnATrueStory) and who also gave his name to [[MulhollandDrive a famous road in California]]. Also, ''Noah'' Cross, who is trying to gain control of all the water in Los Angeles.
** Also, the coroner's name is Morty.
* MetaCasting: John Huston, the director of many of the FilmNoir classics, in the role of the villain.
* MissingWhiteWomanSyndrome: At the beginning of the film, farmers are campaigning for the construction of a new dam which will allow for better irrigation. Hollis explains that the proposed site for the new dam has a shale base, as did the previous dam in the area, which collapsed and killed five hundred people. In a line of dialogue [[AllThereInTheScript present in the screenplay but not the film itself]], Escobar explains that the reason this collapse and all the deaths it caused didn't get sufficient publicity was because most of the people killed were Mexican immigrants.
* MyNameIsNotDurwood: Cross persists in pronouncing Jake's last name as "Gitts" even after he's corrected. Also, Curly addresses him as "Mr. Geetis" a couple times.
* NiceJobBreakingItHero: [[spoiler:Gittes gives Cross the only piece of evidence capable of proving him guilty of murdering Hollis Mulwray.]] Whoops.
** Not to mention [[spoiler:calling the cops on Evelyn under the erroneous belief that she's the culprit]].
* NoodleIncident: We never do find out exactly what happened in Chinatown.
* ObstructiveBureaucrat: The irritating clerk at the Hall of Records seems to be doing everything he can to be as unhelpful as humanly possible.
* OneSceneWonder: An interesting use of this trope. [[spoiler: Noah Cross]] has all of two (three at a push), very brief, scenes in this very long film. He's often remembered as one of the most despicable villains in cinematic history.
** And [[CreatorCameo Polanski himself]], as the Man with the Knife. "You're a very nosy fella, kittycat. You know what happens to nosy fellas? No? Wanna guess?"
* ParentalIncest
* PoliceAreUseless: Well, in Chinatown they are, anyway.
* PoliticallyCorrectHistory: Averted. Even our hero wears his prejudices on his sleeve.
* RapeAsDrama: Although Cross claims otherwise.
* RedHerring: Hollis not wearing his glasses when his body is recovered. Gittes finds a pair of glasses and assumes they belong to him, when in fact they belong to his killer.
* TheReveal[=/=]WhamLine: She's [[spoiler: her sister ''AND'' [[FamilyRelationshipSwitcheroo her daughter]]]].
* ShootTheShaggyDog: In the face. With a {{BFG}}. Repeatedly. "Forget it Jake, it's Chinatown."
* ShoutOut: The casting of JohnHuston, the director of many of the great, early noirs including ''Film/TheMalteseFalcon'' and ''KeyLargo'', as Noah Cross.
** The scene in which Gittes repeatedly slaps Evelyn to try and get her to fess up recalls a similar scene in ''Film/TheMalteseFalcon''.
* SmokingHotSex
* SmugSnake: Quite a few, ranging from lowly policemen to high-ranking {{Corrupt Corporate Executive}}s.
* TheSociopath: Noah Cross.
* StoppedClock: Jack places a watch under the car of the person he's tailing. That way he can know at what time he left by the time the watch was run over.
* TheUnreveal: What exactly happened during Jake's time in Chinatown.
* VeryLooselyBasedOnATrueStory: The city of Los Angeles [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Water_Wars#Los_Angeles_Aqueduct:_the_beginning_of_the_water_wars really did]] steal water from valley farmers. Interestingly, this was neither the first nor the last time the events in question were fictionalized, merely the most well-known.
* WhatCouldHaveBeen: Anjelica Huston, John's real life ''daughter'', as Evelyn Mulwray. {{Squick}}.
** [[HarsherInHindsight It was pretty awkward as it was]], given that Jack Nicholson had just started dating Anjelica in real life, making the scenes where John's character asks "Mr. Gittes, do you sleep with my daughter?" just...uncomfortable.
** ''Chinatown'' was meant to be the first film in a trilogy, each starring Jake Gittes and revolving around corruption during the development of Los Angeles. Jack Nicholson never played another detective character, so that Gittes would remain his iconic PI. Unfortunately the sequel had trouble getting off the ground - thanks to Roman Polanski's rape of at least one underage girl and his subsequent flight to Europe to avoid prosecution - and when [[TheTwoJakes it finally materialized]] ''sixteen years later'', its critical and commercial failure put a kibosh on any chances for the third film.
*** Bizarrely enough, many elements of what would have been the third film turned up in ''Film/WhoFramedRogerRabbit'', notably the freeway arc.
** Robert Towne originally wrote the screenplay with a (comparatively) happy ending, in which [[spoiler: Evelyn and her daughter]] make a successful getaway. Only after a long and bitter debate with Polanski was it changed - at the last minute - to the infamous DownerEnding. Towne later conceded that the film was better that way.
* WretchedHive: From the way Jake reminisces about his days there and the events by the film's end, you can tell Chinatown was one of these.
* WorldHalfEmpty: And completely dry.
* WouldHitAGirl: Jake slaps Evelyn repeatedly to get the truth out of her. When he comes to call in a favour from a man that hired him to find out if his wife was cheating on him, the wife opens the door sporting a huge black eye. In keeping with the DeliberateValuesDissonance, neither of these instances spark much outrage in-universe.
* YourMom: Gittes uses the wife variation to insult a cop:
-->'''Loach''': What happened to your nose, Gittes? Somebody slammed a bedroom window on it?
-->'''Jake''': Nope. Your wife got excited. She crossed her legs a little too quick, [[LampshadedDoubleEntendre you understand what I mean]] pal?.
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