Turning Red

Turning Red (Domee Shi, 2022) Meilin "Mei-Mei" Lee (Rosalie Chiang) is a precocious 13-year old living in the Toronto of 2002. Smart, even effervescent, she is a young adult on the cusp of change, a "tween" in every sense of the word. To her parents, Ming (Sandra Oh) and Jin (Orion Lee), she is a studious, obedient, respectful child, who is only too happy to excel at school, and forego her friends and outside activities to help with the family business, the temple dedicated to her ancestor Sun Yee. She is a credit to her family. But, there must be a debit somewhere. In her own words:

The number one rule in my family? Honor your parents. They're the supreme beings who gave you life who sweated and sacrificed so much to put a roof over your head, food on your plate, an epic amount of food. The least you can do in return is every single thing they ask. 'Course some people are like, Be careful. Honoring your parents sounds great, but if you take it too far, well, you might forget to honor yourself. Luckily, I don't have that problem. I'm Meilin Lee. And ever since I turned 13, I've been doin' my own thing, makin' my own moves; 24/7/365. I wear what I want, say what I want, and I will not hesitate to do a spontaneous cartwheel if I feel so moved!

At school, she is just as industrious...and spontaneous, invoking some envy and taunting from some school-mates, but never from from her posse of gal-pals, Miriam (Ava Morse), Priya (Maitreyi Ramakrishnan), and Abby (Hyein Park). The girls are like musketeers, unquestioningly loyal and all dedicated to the hero-worship of the boy-band, 4*Town (their songs provided by Billie Eilish and Finneas O'Connell), whose posters adorn their walls and their pre-pubescent minds and are just dreeeeeeeeeeeamy! (*squeeallllll!!!*)

But, despite the rock-solid priorities and the high SAT potentials there is one thing that is starting to crowd into her thoughts: boys. For example, the monosyllabic clerk at the Daisy Mart convenience store down the block, Devon. Mei-Mei ❤'s Devon, although this may be peer-perception because the rest of her squad ❤'s Devon. It's not Big-L Love, because it's more like merely emoji-love, but, still, in the privacy of her bed-room and her notebook, she starts doodling fantasy pictures of Devon and when Mom finds out, it is SO embarrassing.

But it gets worse (it gets worse!!!) Mother Ming marches Mei down to the Daisey Mart and confronts the clueless clerk—she blames the clerk, not her little princess—for being a bad influence on her innocent daughter and she does it in front of "people"...and ❤Devon❤...and she could. just. DIE! And the next day, she has to go to school and EVERYBODY will know and it will be just one long humiliation only interrupted by school-bells. She. could. just. DIE. Instead, she has a nightmare involving warring factions in her brain—the temple, her family, and the boys NOT in her life. And she wakes up a giant red panda.

You heard me. She wakes up a giant red panda. Seems that's the family curse, handed down on the matriarchal side, but Mei doesn't know that. All she knows it's she's a "big fat monster" and stinks of fur. Her horror attracts the attention of her Mother, who assumes it's another "curse" ("has the red peony bloomed?") and that Mei has had her first visit from "her little friend". Well, it ain't little. And it's no friend. And it's going to be SO inconvenient at school.

Turning Red (the common phrase for "embarrassment") is not so much about Myth as about Metaphor. Oh, it's sneaky about it, hitting the nail squarely on the head a couple times...and kudos for doing so (hopefully, it'll spark some talk about "women's issues" at home), but creator Shi and her screenwriters, Julia Cho and Sarah Streicher, are talking about other issues beyond mere menstruation. Mei's ursinethropy may remind of "the monthly" but it's more about the hormonal transition from child to young adult, where you're taught to think, but not for yourself. Her transformations have nothing to do with estrogen, but, instead, from moments of high anxiety and high emotion.

This is bad timing for a teen-ager, but The Ancient Ones seemed to have known what they were doing—the pandification was given to Sun Yee in order that she might protect her family and village in times of conflict—as teens are nothing but conflict. Being the sharp tack that she is, Mei comes to learn that she can control her emotions, "zen out" and she transforms back into her original self....well, a ginger version of herself. Except, there's that "raging hormone" thing again...sometimes Mei just can't control herself. Life happens.

And things happen in movies. The challenge in this involves timing and responsibility. On the one hand—the one where her friends are, their favorite band 4*Town is on tour and doing a date in Toronto. Problem? Mother Ming will NOT, absolutely NOT, allow Mei to go to the concert and will CERTAINLY not fork over the $100 bucks for a ticket (uh, remember, this is all taking place in 2002, so tickets did not bankrupt as they do today). No prob', Ming and her gal-pals will find a way. On the furry hand, the whole panda-rama can be taken care of, as it has for centuries, will a ceremony held on the occasion of a blood moon, where the panda spirit will be "re-located" to an amulet Mei will wear around her neck. It pays to accessorize.

Does it all go according to plan? What do you think? We're talking teens here.

What DOES go well is Pixar. Director Shi won an Oscar for her hilarious, emotional but wonderfully off-beat short Bao, and here, she's just as precise in her comedy timing and her way of combining heart and hilarity, about the burdens of cultural expectation (and sub-textually, a woman's lot in life) like a Looney-Tunes Amy Tan novel. And she's hip enough that she throws in quick anime and emoji references that only "ups" the game and lowers the age-requirement for "getting" the wit. This is really good stuff.

In fact, the only quibble I have is that Disney chose—in their infinite attempts to keep Disney product in theaters and Pixar product on their streaming service—to only release it in L.A. and New York theaters for the shortest available time for Oscar consideration. This is a "Big-Screen" movie, the better to appreciate the artistry of the Pixar pixelators who worked so many months to get the details 'just so." Audiences would have clamored for it if it was available (despite the pearl-clutching of some Social Watchdogs).

If anything, it should be Disney that is turning red.

Everything Everywhere All at Once

The Cosmic Comedy

or

"It's Going To Be So Hard To Explain This To You!"

 

For the longest time, the IMDb description for it was "a woman tries to do her taxes." Not something to create a surge at the box office (although I found I couldn't get a seat in a theater for it this weekend).

 

Oh, Everything Everywhere All at Once is about that. But, it's a lot of other things, too.

 

The best way I can describe it is as a negative. Imagine the pitch to Michelle Yeoh: "So, Michelle (I can call you Michelle?)...what kinds of movies HAVEN'T you done? And do you want to do them all in one movie?"

 

That makes it a little bit easier to categorize it than by the seemingly infinite series of hyphenated genres I was coming up with by the end of the thing. Or, by the seemingly infinite number of references and "inside" jokes that permeate through it.

 

No, EEAAO* is it's own thing. Let's create a new genre: Dizzying.

Evelyn Wang (Yeoh) is having a crisis.  Well, okay, several crises in various stages of resolution. It's a mid-life crisis—she's a Chinese immigrant, caught between languages and cultures and married to a man, Waymond (Ke Huy Quan and yes, he was Short Round), who is cheerily ineffectual, whom her father (James Hong) warned her not to marry. She has a daughter, Joy (Stephanie Hsu) who's adolescent and gay—not culturally...cultural. She helps run the family laundromat and they are late on their taxes and there are questionable deductions that are being spotted by the sharp-eyed, sharp-tongued Mrs. Deirdre Beaubeirdra** (Jamie Lee Curtis), who wants all the documentation by the end of the day. The laundromat had a water leak and it's stained one of the ceiling tiles, and her father—the one who disowned her?—has just moved over to the U.S. from China and is living with them, and Evelyn is planning a birthday celebration for him. Plus, she doesn't know...or hasn't noticed...that Waymond has just filed divorce papers.

 

Life happens, am I right?

And whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger. But, instead of having a nervous breakdown, Evelyn has an intervention of sorts. At the headquarters of the IRS, a suddenly very focused Waymond tells her to put on some ear-buds that look like blue-tooth, and gives her a list of instructions to do if things go awry. And while listening to her auditor drone on and on about documentation and receipts, Evelyn suddenly has her attention pulled away...that blue-tooth thingy beeps and, soon, following those written instructions, her attention isn't alone.

As any nerd will tell you, there is a multiverse of possibilities created every time we make a decision in our lives, and Evelyn has been visited by the Waymond of the Alpha Universe to implore her help in a desperate crisis. The Alpha-Evelyn of that Universe is dead, having developed a technology that allows jumping between universes and employing the skills of other similar entities in alternate realities. In other words, Evelyn can download the skills and experiences of those other Universe-Evelyn's in order to defeat the purposes of an entity called Jobu Tupacki.

Why isn't the Alpha-Evelyn doing this? She's dead because she jumped Universes so much her brain fried. Why is this Evelyn being tasked with it? Because of all the Evelyn's in all the Universes, she is the biggest failure, and so her potential is much bigger and she's in less danger of having her brain crisped. So, with the help of Alpha-central and the control room that is feeding her instructions and coordinates—all while they are being attacked by this Jobu Topacki, by the way—she is able to tap into this seemingly infinite number of Evelyns and their skills and experiences.

And they are legion—there's the Evelyn who is a master of martial arts (and a separate one who has learned the mastery of "pinky-fu"), the Evelyn who's an expert at sign-twirling, the master chef, the singer, the actress, the dominatrix, all the Evelyns that have ever been, in all walks of life and forms and sexual orientations, all available to be used, perused and abused, depending on what's available and whether she can perform the actions necessary to receive them. All in the service of circumventing the all-powerful Jobu Topacki.

And the film-makers, Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (call them "Daniels") have a seemingly endless supply of ideas and references to call upon, be it "The Twilight Zone" and Brainstorm and The Matrix and The Wizard of Oz, the malleability of Charlie Kaufman, and the anything-goes zen of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy", the movies of Stanley Kubrick and Wong Kar Wei, Disney/Pixar cartoons, horror movies, teen angst meltdowns, Amy Tan, martial arts, pop-culture, even Japanese porn, in a story that boils down to a domestic drama where the stakes are literally life and death. All done as a comedy; I haven't giggled so much in a movie in years.

Nor have I been as thrilled with the inventiveness of cinema at the hands of film-makers who never let go of the fact that they can do absolutely anything to tell a story. In a way, they have spoiled the multiverse pool for everybody else using the concept for the rest of time. It may even become its own genre after this.

The cast, of course, is perfect. Michelle Yeoh has always been a deft performer, only held back by the reticence of her characters who express themselves more in action. Here, she has a chance to do everything, titularly, and she is amazing, conspiring with film-makers who have  built a love-letter to a performer who has always been superb, but rarely allowed to stretch things to show just how superb she can be (Jackie Chan was the original choice to star and the film-makers sagely changed tacks to create a film of more depth). Quan is a revelation, utilizing his child-star enthusiasm with a more mature presentation, but still keeping that playfulness and total commitment. Stephanie Hsu is a genuine find and traverses seamless transitions from drama to comedy and back with the mastery of an old pro. Speaking of whom, James Hong is here—it is always a pleasure to see him—and, having done literally everything in his 78 year career, this is a welcome opportunity to see a master, still in his prime at 93. Then there's Jamie Lee Curtis, giving a comedic performance (that at times allows her to show her inner "Jason") that is sometimes horrific, sometimes buffoonish, always funny, and always recognizably human. She's a treasure. They all are.

It's a tough movie to sum up, or even let go of, to put "30" to it and not have it careening through your head, assaulting your synapses and simultaneously tickling and tugging your heart, but I think the best to do so is in this distillation of its after-glow penned by Jake Coyle of The Chicago Sun-Times: "And though Everything Everywhere All at Once (a movie that very much lives up to its title) can verge on overload, it’s this liberating sense of limitless possibility that the movie leaves you filled with, both in its freewheeling anything-goes playfulness and in its surprisingly tender portrait of existential despair."

 

*Now, that I think about it—they didn't make a joke about "Old McDonald's Farm" in it. Maybe they did. I may have to see it a fifth time before I catch it.

 

** And I just realized while typing that that it's a reference to the song, "The Name Game"--this movie is DEEEP. 

Blood Alley

Blood Alley (William Wellman, 1955) This production of John Wayne's independent production company, Batjac Productions, Blood Alley must have felt snake-bit from the word "go." Director William Wellman had done a couple of films for Wayne, and Robert Mitchum had starred in the previous Batjac show directed by Wellman, Track of the Cat, and started filming on this film.

 

But, for whatever reason—Wellman thought it was weed, Bacall thought it was booze—Mitchum and the director did not get along on this one, and after an altercation in which Mitchum attacked one of the crew, Wellman contacted Wayne and delivered an ultimatum: "Either he goes or I go."

 

"Wild Bill" stayed. Mitchum went. 

 

But, the film needed a star to play opposite the already-cast Lauren Bacall. Gregory Peck didn't like the script. Humphrey Bogart wanted too much money. So, with a film in production and money on the line, Wayne interrupted his honeymoon to go on location to save the investment on the movie. Not that he had to go very far; this story about the evacuation of a village population out of Communist China was being filmed just outside of San Rafael in San Francisco Bay.

You know it's a different kind of "Duke" movie when the opening scene has Wayne (as Capt. Tom Wilder) talking to himself. John Wayne characters do not talk to themselves. There may be monologues, and he'll even do a scene talking over a grave with credibility. But, any introspection in Wayne's characters do so quietly, without a lot of fuss. So, it's a bit of a hurdle to jump when Wayne's Wilder starts out as a prisoner in a Chinese cell babbling to an imaginary "lady-in-waiting" he calls "Baby." Lord knows how long he's been in that prison—and Wayne plays it with an almost drunken exhaustion to make you think it's been awhile—but, it just doesn't "play."

Wayne's Wilder makes things difficult for his captors by setting fire to his mattress, which they quickly replace with another—rather accommodating for a Chinese prison, as I don't think a 5-star hotel would replace a mattress that fast—in which is secreted a pistol, a Russian officer's uniform, and a note giving him a rendezvous point. Not only is the prison's housekeeping department efficient, they have a great mail department. Security—not so much. So, Wayne escapes because he's over 6 foot, broad in the beam and wearing a Russian uniform in a Chinese prison and must have just walked out because he "blends." We're not shown this, of course, because we have to save up our credulity for the rest of the movie.

Wayne transitions from his cell to walking along a river bank where he comes across "Big Han" and his fishing vessel. Here's another thing about Blood Alley: casting. There are a lot of Chinese actors in the film, mostly background characters, which is all to the good. But, "Big Han" is played by Mike Mazurki, the well-regarded Ukrainian character actor. I only mention he's Ukrainian so as to point out that he is not Chinese. Neither is Paul Fix, who plays a village elder, nor is Berry Kroeger (another elder), and certainly not Anita Ekberg (!!) who plays the very small part of Han's wife, Wei Ling (she has no dialog as she would speak it with a Swedish accent). Look, I'm not so regimental that I think actors can't act parts, or I'd be rejecting Al Pacino in Scarface, or Alec Guinness, Anthony Quinn, and Paul Muni in...everything. But Paul Fix? Anita Ekberg? Couldn't we get somebody from the same hemisphere? On that one point, though, there is one little piece of casting that gave me great joy. I'll leave that to the end.

The main plot is that the village of Chiku Shan has made plans to abandon mainland China and transport all 180 residents to Taiwan by hijacking a stern-wheeler which makes a regular stop on it's regular route up and down the coast. From there, they'll navigate through the Strait of Formosa, known as "Blood Alley," to get away, hence the springing of Capt. Wheeler, who knows the waters, knows the dangers, and hates the commies. It's all been arranged by the village elders and Cathy Grainger (Bacall), daughter of the village doctor, who has recently been taken by the Communists for medical help.

Wellman keeps it moving, although sometimes the Cinemascope frame stumps him. The locations are nicely picturesque—you could believe it's not San Rafael—and the stern-wheeler is as grubby as the African Queen only with 180 extras (genuinely Chinese) and becomes something of a character itself. Wayne is crusty and gruffly paternalistic towards his passengers—but then he always is—and Bacall tries—tries—to make something out of a scripted romance with Wayne*, but it's not too convincing. They're a bit better being at odds with each other; after all, both actors are especially good in conflict.

And that's interesting. At the time, Wayne was deep in his crusade of ridding Hollywood of Communists, and Bacall was very much present in protesting the work of the House Un-American Activities Committee. They couldn't have been farther apart politically and there were attempts, by some in Hollywood, to persuade Wayne to not use Bacall for the picture because of her "pinko" views. Wayne ignored them. But, when Mitchum left the production and Wayne brought in to replace him, Bacall got worried. Instead of any animus, Bacall (in her autobiography) says she found him "to my surprise, warm, likable and helpful,"** and director Wellman "great! A fascinating man!" 

Later, she'd found out that it was Hedda Hopper who'd suggested she be cut—"Don't tell me how to cast my picture" Wayne reportedly growled—and a couple years later at a Clifton Webb-hosted cocktail party, (again from her autobiography) she confronted Hopper calling her "a bitch to try and keep me from working." Hopper replied that, for such an offense, Bacall had every right to give her a kick. "Whereupon she turned around and I kicked her in the ass - most unladylike but very martini-like. Whereupon everyone laughed out loudly and a truce was declared." I think that's my favorite thing about Blood Alley.

Oh, except for one thing. Watching it recently, I spotted a familiar face, that of a much-beloved character actor, in what was (maybe?) his fourth role on-screen—but not credited—as a Communist soldier who enters a room, says a line and leaves. But, it warmed my heart to see him: James Hong, all of 26 years old, unmistakable, and starting a career which continues today. I guarantee you've seen him in something.  Great actor...for comedy and drama, as he proves time and again.

* There is one line I loved—after going through a particularly rough time during a violent storm, Bacall makes a confession that she might be falling for the Captain and Wayne drawls "I think you got me confused with the storm..."

** Wayne was like that, evidently. Ideologically strict. But, personally, he was a gentleman, almost courtly, to women, and "one of the boys" around men. Did they get along? Bacall says when husband Humphrey Bogart was diagnosed with cancer, the first flowers came from Wayne. And when casting for The Shootist (which would, ultimately, be his last film), he asked for Bacall. In September, 2021, the John Wayne Estate released a note they'd found that she'd written to Wayne in 1979, while he was battling his final fight with cancer. 

 

Dear Duke,

This has been on its way to you for months. You have been so very much in my thoughts.  I never have been able to tell you how much you’re standing up for me in ‘Blood Alley’ days meant to me. I wanted to say it on ‘The Shootist’ — never could somehow. — know how difficult that film was for you. You have the guts of a lion — I do admire you more than I can say.  It was so great to see you Academy Award nite. I’m being inarticulate — I want you to know how terrific you are and how really glad I am to know you. You give more than [you] know — I send you much love — constant thoughts

Betty. 

Anytime Movies #7: Chinatown

While I catch up on the reviews still in "Draft" phase here, I'll re-run a feature I ran when I first started this blog seven years ago,****** when it was suggested I do a "Top Ten" List.

I don't like those: they're rather arbitrary; they pit films against each other, and there's always one or two that should be on the list that aren't because something better shoved it down the trash-bin.

So, I came up with this: "Anytime" Movies.

Anytime Movies are the movies I can watch anytime, anywhere. If I see a second of it, I can identify it. If it shows up on television, my attention is focused on it until the conclusion. Sometimes it’s the direction, sometimes it’s the writing, sometimes it’s the acting, sometimes it’s just the idea behind it, but these are the movies I can watch again and again (and again!) and never tire of them. There are ten (kinda). They're not in any particular order, but the #1 movie IS the #1 movie.

This is one of the “Anytime Movies” that falls into the category of “Lost Causes and the Futility of Good Intentions,” but lest anyone think these films are depressing, they’re not.

Well, okay, this one is. But, a good movie never depresses me. It impresses me.

It’s also perfect. Given the nature of the trio of men who oversaw its creation—screenwriter Robert Towne, director Roman Polanski, and producer Robert Evans—the thing could have self-destructed like a fragment grenade. And, in fact, the planned trilogy of films featuring detective JJ “Jake” Gittes investigating three big changes to California's landscape (water, land, and no-fault divorce—which would put Gittes out of a job) stopped after the personality clashes that derailed the first attempt at filming The Two Jakes. Polanski couldn’t set foot on American soil due to rape charges, and Evans (who was producing the film and co-starring in it) and Towne (writing and directing this time) clashed on the set. The combination of expanded roles and egos this go-round, following upon the first film’s success, caused the production-gears, already turning, to stall (necessitating the destruction of returning production designer Richard Sylbert's already finished sets), and it was only the patience and dogged efforts of star Jack Nicholson, who took over directing, that allowed the film to be made...ever. They say that great films need a miracle – Chinatown had it, but its sequel The Two Jakes didn’t have a prayer.

“Middle of a drought and the water commissioner drowns. Only in L.A., huh?” 

Based loosely on the development and construction of the William Mulholland designed aqueduct, and the real estate swindles it engendered, Chinatown starts out as a mystery even more steeped in the locale of L.A. than Chandler’s Marlowe stories. Here, the very city is a part of the crime and corruption is steeped in its soil and water. Water is the heart of Chinatown. Its ebbs and flows are constantly monitored –the original object of investigation is the city’s head of the Department of Water and Power who then becomes the victim of a grisly murder. Water is never too far from the surface of the story. Even Jerry Goldsmith’s shimmering score suggests water in its low harp trills, and the sighing of, yes, water phones.

Chinatown gets all its details right—the language, the costumes—Richard Sylbert’s period work is amazing, and a perfect cast makes the most of Robert Towne’s wise-acre dialog. A perfect cast? Right down to the smallest part. There’s a favorite moment of mine when Gittes, after badgering the secretary of the new head of Water and Power, is distracted by an odd squeaking noise. He, of course, has to investigate, and opens the outside door on the two work-men who are scraping the dead man’s name off the door. The one guy looks irritated—the other guy smiles, nods, and as the door is closing shakes his head ruefully—“Happens every time.” It’s a tiny little moment that feels so authentic, so much more than a mere movie might provide, it provides a moment of truth in a continuous string of truths.

One of Chinatown's weird echoes:  the face of Mrs. Mulwray (Faye Dunaway)
while Jake and she talk about his past, walking the beat in Chinatown.

But, that is a moment you can appreciate as it happens. Chinatown lives on in the memory. After the mystery is solved, moments come back, as the pieces come together and the journey to the conclusion coalesces. They haunt. On repeat viewings, Chinatown is a treasure trove of call-backs and foreshadowing’s.* Little things, like the odd cadence of a name, mispronunciations that can be traced back, a birth-mark—lead you downstream to a resolution that you should, in retrospect, have seen all along. Like Gittes, its only at the end that you get the full story. Of course, like him, you follow the most obvious things that seem out of place or arouse suspicions. ** But the world is a more complicated place and long after the film is finished does it strike you that the two most suspicious people while watching the film are actually the most decent and altruistic ones acting with the best of intentions. Of course, in this world they come to a bad end.

“Do you know how long I've been in this business?

And here’s where that mix of personalities comes in. Towne’s original screenplay (before the Polanski re-write) is very grey—Jake Gittes at the beginning of the film—the very beginning—gets angry and abusive with his moaning client, Curly (In the film, there’s only an impatient irritation). Later dialog casts a sympathetic spin on water magnate Noah Cross. The original screenplay ends with, if not a happy ending, then a triumphant one. Evans loved the screenplay (though he didn’t quite "get" it), but in one of those odd bursts of inspiration that sustained him throughout an eccentric career as a producer, decided that the film needed a European sensibility, and so, brought in Polanski, who had left the country and Los Angeles following the murder of his wife Sharon Tate by the Manson family. 

His perverse take on the city and the material focused it, and made a stronger delineation between good that is good and evil that is truly evil—and provided the ending that doomed those most in need of rescuing. Chinatown ends in shock, and with a sense of tragic inevitability. That Jake, in a moment of selfishness and hubris, sets up a series of events that ends up completely bollixing up his good intentions, completes a circle and a character arc that had been percolating below the surface the entire time. He ends up ignoring the lessons he learned in Chinatown (the district, not the film), and paying the same consequences. The final words are ironic--“Forget it, Jake. It’s Chinatown.” Forgetting isn’t his problem. Remembering is. Towne would hammer the point home with the last line of The Two Jakes—“Kitty! You never get over it.”

But by that time it wasn’t necessary to say.

Jake wants the truth.
He can't handle the truth.

Anytime Movies:

Chinatown
American Graffiti
To Kill a Mockingbird
Goldfinger
Bonus: Edge of Darkness

Above, you'll see a link to a fascinating book by Sam Wasson called "The Big Goodbye: Chinatown and the Last Years of Hollywood." I just finished reading it, and it has a nifty little conceit: it takes the four principles—Polanski, Towne, Evans, and Nicholson—and relates how they struggled (separately and together and against each other) to make the film, saw its stunning successful and quite unconsciously (maybe) turning their lives into a version of the story...with ample help from history, ego, hubris, toxic masculinity, rampant sexism, too much opportunity and too much cocaine. Their failings get the better of them, and, with their eyes wide shut, they no longer become the heroes of their own stories. None of them come out looking good, and the one hero of the story seems to be composer Jerry Goldsmith (yay!), who received a knock on his door from Robert Evans one day, begging him to help replace a score that wasn't working to Evans' mind, and within 10 days had created a full score, the main theme of which made Evans weep. Fascinating read, with a lot of threads to it, and Wasson's style is fast moving and doom-laden. But, it doesn't have a happy ending.

* On my most recent viewing, I noticed a moment that shocked me. After Jake and Evelyn flee a scene in her car amidst a hail of gunfire, the superbly coiffed Evelyn touches her left eye—as if she has something in it. Whether it was Polanski’s or Dunaway’s choice, it’s a brilliantly sick one. 

** Towne’s screenplay is so fully formed that, unlike Chandler’s Marlowe stories, a first person narrative isn’t necessary. We are always aware of what Gittes is doing, and thanks to Nicholson’s performance, what he’s thinking.

"Forget it, Jake."

And...an extra.

This was part of a series of reviews of the ASUW Film series back in the '70's. Except for some punctuation, I haven't changed anything from the way it was presented, giving the kid I was back in the '70's a bit of a break. Any stray thoughts and updates I've included with the inevitable asterisked post-scripts. Chinatown was part of a "detective" double-bill with The Thin Man.

Chinatown (Roman Polanski, 1974)

Gittes: Hello Claude. Where'dja get the midget?
Midget: Yer a nosey fellow, kitty-kat, huh? Ya know what happens to nosey fellas, huh? No? Wanna guess? Huh? No? (slices Gittes' nose). Next time you lose the whole thing. Cut it off and feed it to my goldfish. Understand? Understand?!
Mulvehill: Tell 'im you understand, Gittes.
Gittes: I unnerstand!

As opposed to the whimsy of The Thin Man, Chinatown is a film of deadly earnest, a perfect example of what is termed "film noir"-which means, in melodramatic terms "when the streets are dark with something more than night," usually the feeling of purveying evil. That is certainly there in Chinatown, although it would be hard to pin that evil on the influence of the film's all-encompassing villain, or the influence of its director, Roman Polanski, who incidentally played that strangely accented "midget" with a knife you heard in that tape segment.*** Polanski shaped this film into a first-rate thriller, even more, into the best film coming out of a major studio in 1974, deserving of every Oscar that The Godfather Part II won that year.**** As with most of these films, each and every performance is perfectly played from the starring performances of Jack Nicholson, Faye Dunaway, John Huston and John Hillerman, down to a lowly sign painter.*****

Chinatown--a section of Los Angeles inhabited mostly by Asian-Americans due to a suppression of their people.

Chinatown--the former beat of two L.A. patrolmen, J.J. Gittes and Lou Escobar; a beat they think in "bad luck" for "you can't always tell what's going on."

Chinatown--the symbol of all evil to Jake Gittes, private detective, for it reminds him of his own tragic failures.

"Mrs. Mulwray, have you ever heard the expression 'let sleeping dogs lie?"

Jake Gittes is hired by a Mrs. Mul'-wray to investigate her "philandering" husband. But as Jake investigates, he realizes that Mr. Mul-wray' is not what he seems, Mrs. Mul'-wray is not what she seems, and Jake finds himself investigating a larger scandal, one encompassing city-wide fraud and personal tragedy. Jake knows all the moves he is supposed to make while investigating--tailing, picking up clues, following them to the next step--and the whole way, he thinks he has the whole case going smoothly. But he doesn't. It is much too big for him to stop. He ignores those little details that he, and we, only can remember later. And Jake Gittes, when the case is over, relives a tragic part of his past, and can only take consolation in the caring words of an associate--"Forget it, Jake. It's Chinatown."

"But, Mrs. Mulwray, I goddamn near lost my nose. And I like it. I like breathing through it.
And I still think you're hiding something."

The ending of Chinatown is a complete reversal of what the film had, supposedly, been leading up to. It will undoubtedly shock and disappoint you. Some critics have said it is ill-considered and "tacked on." But it isn't. It is perfect for the film that Roman Polanski made, and it makes the experience of viewing Chinatown that much more resonant.

Broadcast on KCMU-FM November 11th and 12th, 1975.

Some revisions should be made to this (if I were making revisions). I was being too much of a "nanny" critic, telling people how they should feel. And I kind of blew any surprise that ending SHOULD have had by telling an audience to expect it.

And Chinatown isn't "the symbol of all evil" for Gittes. That's giving him too much thought for the place. It's just a place to be avoided. Bad luck. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice--

And Walsh's words to Gittes aren't "caring," he says it because there's nothing more to say. "Get over it. What'd you expect?"

I've written about Chinatown more extensively here (actually the article at the top of the page). But there's more to say. Reading a nearly final script by Towne of this film tells you that Polanski brought more sense of moral rage to the film (interesting, for Polanski). Evil is evil. Good is good. I've always "gotten" the sense that Hollis Mulwray is not only a good man, but practically a saint. There are things implied in Polanski's direction that point even further in that thought. But, in Towne's screenplay, more sympathy is ascribed to the villain. He is not pure evil as the film would have him appear. He is merely weak, and anything can happen in a moment of weakness. Evelyn Mulwray is also less of a victim in that screenplay, though her actions are seen to be a trifle hysterical. There are no easy answers in Towne's early screenplay. Things are not black and white, merely shades of gray. And given Polanski's history--the concentration camps, and his wife, Sharon Tate's grisly murder at the hands of the Manson gang, and his own past films, one would see why he'd tilt it to the side of the devils.

"He OWNS the police!"

In 1991, Chinatown became a part of the National Film Registry.

*** Yeah--you don't get the taped segment. Sorry. The transcript will have to do. I've always loved the way Nicholson drawled out "Hello, Claaaahde. Where'dja git the midgit?" It runs a close second to my favorite Nicholson line, from Five Easy Pieces: "Don't tell me 'bout the GOOD life, Eldon, 'cuz it makes me PUKE!"

**** Although The Godfather, Part II also deserved every Oscar it won. Except maybe score. And I don't think that's hyperbole saying the best film coming out of a major studio that year. That's also due to its Executive Producer, the extremely savvy producer Robert Evans. Say what you will about Evans, but under his stewardship, Paramount could not be topped as the dominant movie studio in Hollywood. Look at 'em now, folks.

***** Actually, Chinatown is one of the few films where every performance is perfect. And that sign painter--it's one of my favorite bits in movies, because it rings so true. The guy's watching his assistant scrape the name off a door, and that scrape gets detective Gittes to investigate, opening the door. The painters look up at Gittes, who, realizing what it is, shuts the door...and AS IT'S CLOSING, the guy in charge replaces his nodding greeting with a rueful shake of his head "Happens every time." Of course it does. But it's the sort of detail Chinatown is full of, as so few movies are.

****** And, on Sunday, we'll put up a "Don't Make a Scene" feature from each week's film.