Rotten
As much as I admire the work of both Polanski and Nicholson, I found Chinatown tedious from beginning to just before the end.
Gene Siskel, Chicago Tribune
Chinatown
You get tough. You get tender. You get close to each other. Maybe you even get close to the truth.
1974 · 2h 10m · R
Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Directed by
Roman Polanski
Overview
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.
Director and cast
- Roman Polanski Director
- Jack Nicholson as Jake Gittes
- Faye Dunaway as Evelyn Cross Mulwray
- John Huston as Noah Cross
- Perry Lopez as Lieutenant Lou Escobar
- John Hillerman as Russ Yelburton
- Diane Ladd as Ida Sessions
- Roman Polanski as Man with Knife
- Roy Jenson as Claude Mulvihill
- Richard Bakalyan as Detective Loach
- James Hong Cast
Critics on Rotten Tomatoes
Top critics, in their words
98%
Tomatometer
Fresh
Roman Polanski's American made film, first since Rosemary's Baby shows him again in total command of talent and physical filmmaking elements.
A.D. Murphy, Variety
Fresh
Polanski's film suggests that the rules of the game are written in some strange, untranslatable language, and that everyone's an alien and, ultimately, a victim.
Don Druker, Chicago Reader
Fresh
In 1974 a director, a screenwriter, and a producer (Robert Evans, who for once deserves a few of the plaudits he's apportioned himself) could decide to beat a genre senseless and then dump it in the wilds of Greek tragedy.
Jessica Winter, Village Voice
Fresh
A new private-eye melodrama that celebrates not only a time and a place (Los Angeles) but also a kind of criminality that to us jaded souls today appears to be nothing worse than an eccentric form of legitimate private enterprise.
Vincent Canby, New York Times
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