Chinatown

Directed in 1974 by Roman Polanski from a script by Robert Towne, Chinatown is a brilliant reworking of film noir set in a drought-stricken Los Angeles of the 1930s. Jack Nicholson stars as J. J. Gittes, a private eye who, despite his best intentions, can bring only disaster on Evelyn Mulwray (Faye Dunaway), the enigmatic woman he has come to love. Gittess investigation into the death of Evelyns husband exposes a chaos of political corruption and sexual violence lurking beneath a glittering, sun-bleached surface. Michael Eatons compelling study situates Chinatown in relation to a history of fictional detectives, from Sophocles to Edgar Allan Poe and Alfred Hitchcock. In an absorbing account of the films narrative development and visual style, he traces Chinatowns relationship to the pessimism of American cinema (and, by extension, the wider culture) in the mid-1970s, and the source of the films narrative and visual impact. In his afterword to this new edition, Eaton considers Chinatowns 1990 sequel The Two Jakes and also the movies changing fortunes in the years since its release.