Chinatown (1974)

Private Investigator Jake Gittes (Jack Nicholson) is hired by a woman to find out if her husband is having an affair. Husband is Mulwray, a big-wig at the drought stricken Los Angeles water department and is seeing a young blonde. The scandal goes public, lawsuits are filed, and shenanigans come to light about the water department and things become complex.

If you don’t like films where you don’t know what’s going on, Chinatown is not for you. Everyone has secrets and nothing is as it seems. Diane Ladd had a small role. You know, Laura Dern’s mom. There are a few pieces of trivia I’d like to include here but it would reveal details best revealed by watching. I won’t do it to this caliber of film, leaving me with less to say.

Chinatown is neo-noir, a modern interpretation of the 40’s and 50’s film style. It is set in the late 1930’s and follows many of the same conventions but with a more modern sensibility. Code-banned topics are dealt with using code-banned language. Nicholson’s Jake is present in every scene.

Many lesser films use the obfuscation game to make their films seem complex or deep. But Chinatown is a masterpiece. All the pieces fit together in the end, the performances are exceptional, and the cinematography is spectacular. It demands a second viewing and I look forward to that. Too bad the director is a child molester. AMRU 4.5.

“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 Terror (1963)

Andre (Jack Nicholson) is a Napoleonic soldier separated from his battalion. Exhausted and thirsty, he happens upon a hot young woman (Sandra Knight) who calls herself Helene. She leads him to water then tries to drown him. He wakes up in the cabin of an old woman who says he just imagined the young woman. Her mute servant tells him (just go with it) to seek the girl at the castle of the Baron Victor von Leppe (Boris Karloff), who says he just imagined the young woman. But Andre is obsessed.

There is so much wrong with this film. Jack and Barron henchman Dick Miller’s stilted and unnatural delivery appear to channel Keanu Reeves. There are extended shots of Karloff pointlessly walking, ape-like, around his underfurnshed mansion slowly coming to the realization that he will never again be in a good movie. The secrets of the movie are revealed in a haphazard way and the great twist at the end would make even soap opera fans groan.

What really happened here is that director Roger Corman finished early on The Raven (1963), sent everyone but Karloff and Nicholson home, then filmed random scenes of Karloff on existing sets. He then continued with Jack and a couple other actors trying to improvise a new movie. When the editors came back and said it was a mess, they had Nicholson and Miller do some exposition in a studio to try and fit it all together.

The core of the story isn’t bad. A witch mesmerizes a young woman who resembles the Barron’s dead wife to torment him for killing her son. Not great, but by B movie standards, not bad at all. But it doesn’t work because of the previously mentioned terrible acting, the ‘saved it in the editing’ filming schedule, and the mind numbingly stupid twists at the end (yea, that’s right, two stupid twists). Dick and Jack are fighting, then cooperate, then fight again. No reason. Fix those problems and you will have a serviceable if forgettable film. With those problems you have a film Jack Nicholson wants everyone to forget.

I remember a scene at the very end of a film I saw as a boy that stuck with me. I didn’t remember the content of the story nor the context of the scene. That film was this and that scene was dumb plot twist number two. I remember the actor reacting not with horror but with an ‘Ew, that’s gross!’ look on his face. That part was remembered correctly.

I’m sure Roger Corman turned a profit on The Terror. He was notorious for his tight shoots and tighter budgets. He wouldn’t spend a nickel to make a movie better unless it returned him a dime. He didn’t have the luxury of time here but I can’t help think that with a little better planning and some creative writing even the twists could have been successful. As it exists, however, AMRU 2.

The Shining (1980)

Jack Torrance (Jack Nicholson) takes the position of off season caretaker of the Grand Overlook Hotel. Turns out the former caretaker had some troubles, and those troubles seem to be following Jack and his family. But, as they say, all work and no play ...

Somehow I had managed to miss seeing this horror classic, and while I've watched the famous scenes to death, there was a good deal of the story I did not know. Young Danny (young Danny) has "The Shining", which means he can hear thoughts and pick up impressions left before. And other stuff. He has an imaginary friend named Tony (Redruuuum!) He only had one other acting credit, a TV movie about G. Gordon Liddy. He played young G.

I was thrilled to watch this at Movies on the Block, but towards the end, when Wendy (Shelley Duvall) was at wit's end running from Jack, people laughed. I was offended. I wanted to find Duvall, hug her, and tell her everything is going to be all right. All performances here were stellar, but her's surprised me.

Based on the Stephen King novel, this is a Stanley Kubrick movie, make no mistake. Tone, character, and story elements are changed to agree with the director's genius (King hated his treatment of the material). His attention to detail is legendary, as are his tactics. Duvall was treated poorly on camera and off to give her a beleaguered feeling. The scene on the stairs when she waived a baseball bat, it was said, was done in 127 takes.

There is way too much to say about any Kubrick movie, The Shining in particular, so I will again leave with someone else's video. There is no end to interpretations on its meaning. This is a spectacularly well made horror movie, one of the best in the genre. Room 237 is crap. AMRU 4.5.

"Wendy, I'm home."