Chinatown ( China town )

Chinatown (DVD) (*)

Out of Stock

Original Title: China town
Screened, competed or awarded at:
BAFTA Awards
Edgar Allan Poe Awards
Golden Globes
Oscar Academy Awards
Other Film Festival Awards

Language Selections:
Danish ( Subtitles )
Dutch ( Subtitles )
English ( Dolby Digital 5.1 )
English ( Subtitles )
Finnish ( Subtitles )
French ( Dolby Digital 2.0 )
French ( Subtitles )
German ( Dolby Digital 2.0 )
German ( Subtitles )
Italian ( Dolby Digital 2.0 )
Italian ( Subtitles )
Norwegian ( Subtitles )
Spanish ( Dolby Digital 2.0 )
Spanish ( Subtitles )
Swedish ( Subtitles )

Product Origin/Format:
United Kingdom ( PAL/Region 2 )

Running Time:
125 min

Aspect Ratio:
Anamorphic Widescreen (2.35:1)

Special Features:
Anamorphic Widescreen
Collectors Edition
Interactive Menu
Scene Access
Trailer(s)

Movie filmed in 1974 and produced in:
United States ( USA, Canada )

Directed By:
Roman Polanski

Written By:
Robert Towne

Actors:
Jack Nicholson ..... J.J. Gittes
Faye Dunaway ..... Evelyn Mulwray
John Huston ..... Noah Cross
Perry Lopez ..... Escobar
John Hillerman ..... Yelburton
Darrell Zwerling ..... Hollis Mulwray
Diane Ladd ..... Ida Sessions
Roy Jenson ..... Mulvihill
Roman Polanski ..... Man with Knife
Richard Bakalyan ..... Loach
Joe Mantell ..... Walsh
Bruce Glover ..... Duffy
Nandu Hinds ..... Sophie
James O'Rear ..... Lawyer
James Hong ..... Evelyn's Butler

Synopsis:

A landmark movie in the film noir tradition, Roman Polanski's Chinatown stands as a true screen classic. Jack Nicholson is private eye Jake Gittes, living off the murky moral climate of sunbaked, pre-war Southern California. Hired by a beautiful socialite (Faye Dunaway) 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 for one, unforgettable night in ... Chinatown. Co-starring film legend John Huston and featuring an Academy Award-winning script by Robert Towne, Chinatown captures a lost era in a masterfully woven movie that remains a timeless gem.

You may think you know what you're dealing with, but believe me, you don't, warns water baron Noah Cross (John Huston), when smooth cop-turned-private eye J.J. 'Jake' Gittes (Jack Nicholson) starts nosing around Cross's water diversion scheme. That proves to be the ominous lesson of Chinatown, Roman Polanski's critically lauded 1974 revision of 1940s film noir detective movies. In 1930s Los Angeles, 'matrimonial work' specialist Gittes is hired by Evelyn Mulwray (Faye Dunaway) to tail her husband, Water Department engineer Hollis Mulwray (Darrell Zwerling). Gittes photographs him in the company of a young blonde and figures the case is closed, only to discover that the real Mrs. Mulwray had nothing to do with hiring Gittes in the first place. When Hollis turns up dead, Gittes decides to investigate further, encountering a shady old-age home, corrupt bureaucrats, angry orange farmers, and a nostril-slicing thug (Polanski) along the way. By the time he confronts Cross, Evelyn's father and Mulwray's former business partner, Jake thinks he knows everything, but an even more sordid truth awaits him. When circumstances force Jake to return to his old beat in Chinatown, he realizes just how impotent he is against the wealthy, depraved Cross. 'Forget it, Jake,' his old partner tells him. 'It's Chinatown.' Reworking the somber underpinnings of detective noir along more pessimistic lines, Polanski and screenwriter Robert Towne convey a '70s-inflected critique of capitalist and bureaucratic malevolence in a carefully detailed period piece harkening back to the genre's roots in the 1930s and '40s. Gittes always has a smart comeback like Humphrey Bogart's Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe, but the corruption Gittes finds is too deep for one man to stop. Other noir revisions, such as Robert Altman's The Long Goodbye (1973) and Arthur Penn's Night Moves (1975), also centered on the detective's inefficacy in an uncertain '70s world, but Chinatown's period sheen renders this dilemma at once contemporary and timeless, pointing to larger implications about the effects of corporate rapaciousness on individuals. Polanski and Towne clashed over Chinatown's ending; Polanski won the fight, but Towne won the Oscar for Best Screenplay. Chinatown was nominated for ten other Oscars, including Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, Cinematography, Art Direction, Costumes, and Score.

It's 1937 Los Angeles. Specializing in cases of cheating spouses, private investigator Jake 'J.J.' Gittes is tailing Hollis Mulwray, whose wife suspects him of marital infidelity. Mulwray is the high profile chief engineer for the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power. Him being high profile is because of the chronic drought in the Los Angeles area and the importance of fresh water to the growing community. Most of what Gittes witnesses in following Mulwray are some usual and some not so usual business dealings, among the former being a public meeting for construction of a new dam to create an additional water supply for Los Angeles, the dam which Mulwray opposes. But Gittes eventually witnesses Mulwray meeting with a young unknown woman who is not his wife. Once news of the supposed tryst between Mulwray and this woman hits the media, additional information comes to light that makes Gittes believe that Mulwray is being framed for something and that he himself is being set-up. Gittes is assisted in his investigation of the issue behind Mulwray's framing and his own set-up by Mulwray's wife, Evelyn Mulwray. Despite Evelyn's help, Gittes also believes that she isn't being totally forthright with him. The further he gets into the investigation, the more secrets he uncovers about the professional and personal dealings of the Mulwrays, which includes Mulwray's former business partnership with Evelyn's father, Noah Cross. The identity of the unknown woman may be the key to uncovering the whole story.

This product was added to our catalog on Tuesday 06 September, 2011.