Dry land of photography

Chinese name: Chinatown

Director: roman polanski roman polanski

Main performance:

Jack Nicholson

Faye Dunaway's faye dunaway

John Huston John Huston

Perry Lopez Perry Lopez

John Hillerman from john seale.

Darville Xavier Darrell Zwering

Release date: 65438+ June 20th, 0974, USA.

Location: USA

Dialogue: English

Color: color

Sound: stereo

Duration: 13 1

Type: mystery of crime

Grading:

Singapore: NC- 16 Iceland: 16 Argentina: 16 Canada: a Britain: 15 Australia: m Canada: 13 Canada: PG Canada: r Finland: K- 16 Netherlands.

synopsis

The story took place in Los Angeles on 1937. Jack was a policeman in Chinatown. He found that Chinatown is a place free from social and moral constraints. No one asked about crime or even murder, so he quit his job and became a private detective, specializing in erotic events.

On this day, a woman who claimed to be Mrs. Moraret came to the detective station and claimed that her husband was having an affair. She doesn't care how much it costs, just wants to find out who that woman is.

Jack accepted the commission. He learned that Hollis Mollaret, the chief engineer of the water department of the Los Angeles city government, was protested by local farmers because he opposed the construction of the dam.

Jack continued to track Hollis and found that he had been investigating the drought in the suburbs all day. The photo taken by his assistant proves that there is a woman with Hollis. In addition, he also found that Hollis had a fierce quarrel with a man named Noah.

Before the investigation was clear, suddenly a woman who claimed to be Mrs. Moraret came to visit. This time it was the real Mrs. Moraret-Evelyn. She accused Jack of investigating Hollis and told him that she had filed a lawsuit in court. Soon a summons came from the court, and the sudden change of events made Jack interested in Hollis.

Jack went to Hollis' office to ask him face to face, but Hollis wasn't there. Lars, the deputy chief engineer, met him and told him that the news that Hollis opposed to building the dam in the newspaper made the water conservancy department very nervous. As for the affair, he said it was incredible. Jack went straight to Hollis's house. He noticed that there was a seawater reservoir in the garden. Evelyn told him that Hollis might have gone to Oak Bay Reservoir.

In Oak Bay Reservoir, Jack found that Hollis had drowned in the reservoir, which the police thought was suicide. Jack felt suspicious and went to the morgue and the scene of the accident alone to investigate and found many doubts. In the reservoir, he was also cut with a knife. The attacker warned him not to mind his own business, or his nose would be cut off. At the same time, Evelyn went to see him again and said that she would drop the lawsuit. The woman who used to pretend to be Mrs. Moraret also called and said that her name was Ida, and she was an actress, pretending to be directed by others. This series of strange events made Jack gradually realize the complexity of the case.

Jack happened to find that Hollis and Noah were partners in their early years and shared the water source in Los Angeles. Later, Hollis Lord Zhang Weimin used water and fell out with Noah. Noah is also the owner of the reservoir. He has many connections in the city government and is very powerful. What surprised Jack even more was that Evelyn turned out to be Noah's daughter.

Jack has made great progress in his investigation. He found that it was Lars who released water out of the state every night, not the farmers in the suburbs. He found that some people bought a lot of dry farmland, but all the people who registered property rights were old people in nursing homes. They know nothing about buying land. In order to find the answer, Jack is determined to find Noah.

[Edit this paragraph] Wonderful dialogue

Walsh: Forget it, Jack. This is Chinatown.

Walsh: Forget it, Jack. This is Chinatown.

Evelyn Murray: She is my daughter.

Evelyn Murray: She is my daughter.

[Gittes slaps Evelyn]

[Gotz slaps Evelyn]

Jack gittes: I said I want the truth!

Jack Gotz: I want the truth!

Evelyn Murray: She is my sister. ...

Evelyn Murray: She is my sister. ...

[slap]

[slaps Evelyn again]

Evelyn Murray: She is my daughter. ...

Evelyn Murray: She is my daughter. ...

[slap]

[slaps Evelyn again]

Evelyn Murray: My sister, my daughter.

Evelyn Murray: My sister, my daughter.

[More slaps]

[More slaps and slaps]

Jack gittes: I said I want the truth!

Jack Gotz: I said I want the truth!

Evelyn Murray: She is my sister and daughter!

Evelyn Murray: She is my sister and my daughter!

[Edit this paragraph] behind-the-scenes production

About movies

This nostalgic detective film with complex plot and strong drama atmosphere can be called a black classic of 70' s movies. Polanski's cool style carried out the whole film, from the script to the director, the acting, photography and soundtrack were all first-class standards, which caused a great sensation when it was released.

Chinatown is a metaphor in the film: this mysterious and exotic land seems to be a place free from social and moral constraints. No one cares about crime and murder, and the faces of China people in the film are cold and expressionless. So the hero Jack quit his job as a policeman and became a private detective. But the shadow of "Chinatown" is always everywhere. For Jack, it was like a nightmare following him. But in fact, no land in this world is clean, and Los Angeles in the sunshine seems to be just an extension of Chinatown.

One of Polanski's most complicated tasks in this film is to recreate Los Angeles in 1930s: the film shows the characteristics of the traditional western American Southern California, where rivers, valleys, streets and houses are shrouded in a pale yellow tone. Polanski uses a lot of indoor low-light environment and night scenes, and through carefully arranged paragraphs, the whole film brings the audience into boundless darkness little by little with a leisurely attitude.

This film has won many international awards, including Oscar for Best Screenplay, Golden Globe for Best Drama and Best Actor.

drama

Chinatown, which won the Best Original Screenplay Award in the 47th Oscar, is considered as the best screenplay in the 1970s, no less than now. Now pick a few American books about script skills at random in the bookstore, and eight out of ten books must mention Chinatown. Screenwriter robert donner has constructed a nearly perfect script: no matter its main story, sub-line, background of the times or dynamic visual expression, all these have woven a complete and fascinating screen illusion for the audience, and the director hardly needs to make any changes when shooting according to this movie script.

It is said that robert donner and Polanski had an argument over the ending. Robert donner prefers the happy ending where justice is done, but Polanski doesn't agree with this happy ending and finally decides to shoot first. Towards the end of filming, Polanski persuaded the producer and Donna to give the film an unexpected ending. This ending was firmly remembered by American cynics who watched movies at that time: they finally knew that Hollywood genre films were not always pleasant.

executant

Two big stars, Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway, both performed well in this film. Donnelly's sentence "She is my sister, no, she is my daughter, no, she is my sister, my daughter" is very dramatic, and the performance of the two actors in this climax can be described perfectly. John huston, an old star, vividly explained a cunning, mercenary and incestuous profiteer. Although he didn't appear many times, he showed the abomination of an unscrupulous chaebol well. Director Polanski also made a guest appearance as the man who stabbed Detective Jack Nicholson with a knife.

background music

Jerry Goldsmith, the master of film soundtrack, was nominated for 18 Oscars in his career of nearly 50 years, and won 1976 Oscars for the soundtrack of The Omen. Goldsmith's works are never superficial, but go deep into the hearts of the characters and are famous for their courage to try. For example, when conducting Planet of the Apes (1968), in order to achieve special effects, he asked the conductor to take off the mouthpiece and blow the copper pipe directly. He also won the reputation in the industry because of his amazing creative speed. When the work of the first composer in Chinatown was rejected, the producer found Goldsmith to put out the fire. It took him only nine days to complete the soundtrack of the whole film, avoiding making the film a complete disaster. But such a fast speed did not prevent him from creating classics. The soundtrack of Chinatown used a rare combination of four pianos, four harps, stringed instruments, percussion instruments and trumpets at that time, and now this combination has become a classic soundtrack combination of Private Detective movies.

[Edit this paragraph] One sentence comment

Godard once said that the only way to comment on a film is to make another film, which is exactly what Polanski did: he created a model that has never been seen before in this country.