Chinatown (1974) - dir. Roman Polanski - Movie Review Example

Gittes follows Hollis moves, takes pictures of him with a young woman, and hears him oppose the development of new reservoir that makes the headline of the following newspaper. A beautiful woman confronts Gittes in his office; she claims to be the real Evelyn Mulwray and he can anticipate a lawsuit. He notices it is a set up and Gittes wants to establish the person behind it and his investigations guides him to Mulwray’s drowned body. Gittes suspects murder, he investigates and realizes that every night, huge quantities of water are released from the reservoir, and the land is almost dry.

Gittes realizes that Hollis was once a business partner of John Huston (Noah Cross) his father. Noah Cross promises to give Gittes a huge amount if he succeeds in looking for Hollis missing girlfriend. As Gittes investigates the missing of Hollis girlfriend, he discovers that many orange groves have transformed their ownership in San Fernando. When Gittes visits San Fernando Valley, he is confronted and beaten by angry landowners who thought that he was from the water department who had been destroying and poisoning their water reservoirs to force them out of their land.

Gittes finds out that Mulwray was killed when he knew that the new water tank would be used to irrigate newly bought properties. Gittes unravels a murder drama, which looks to be linked to the water reservoirs in San Fernando Valley. The conspiracy that Gittes unravels does not fit a real noir crime film because there is the absence of high-speed loot, no gems, and jewels. Instead, Huston, and other people are planning to dry up the San Fernando Valley by moving water to another direction in order to purchase the land cheaply, and then re-divert water back into the land so that the land becomes fertile, and sell it at a higher price.

The central question is how Evelyn Mulwray fits in all this activities and who is this mysterious woman associated with