Chinatown (1974)

I recently had a friend tell me that they did not really think that Jack Nicholson was that great an actor, then she admitted that she had never seen Chinatown. That is unacceptable. I don't think Nicholson has ever been better (even though he didn't win an Oscar until One Flew Over the Cuckoo's nest the next year) or better looking. Faye Dunaway had not yet started chewing the scenery as she has in most, if not all, of her post Mommie Dearest roles. Roman Polanski was still living in the United States, and Robert Towne, still one of the best writers in Hollywood, when he feels like it (we won't count Mission Impossible II) wrote one of the best scripts ever.

The basic idea behind the movie was to do a crime drama about the really big crimes perpetrated by men who don't go to jail, instead they get their names on buildings. Towne took the basic narrative of the men who created Los Angeles by solving it's water problem and added some VERY dramatic fictions, then drops a Sam Spade-esque private investigator in the middle of it and in a position where he feels he must unravel it all. It's the 1930s, the depths of the depression and J.J. 'Jake' Gittes (Jack Nicholson), former cop and PI is making a living specializes in sleazy matrimonial work - meaning spying on cheating husbands. Hired for what appears to be just another job catching a cheating spouse by Mrs. Mulwray he instead finds himself in the headlines, threatened with lawsuits, attacked with a knife, attacked by a crazy family of farmers trying to guard their water, falling in love, and threatened by one of the most powerful men in town. It's a fascinating and complicated plot.

Every time I watch this movie (and that's a lot of times) I notice something I never noticed before. A couple of years ago I noticed a song that was playing in a restaurant scene between Nicholson and  Dunaway and in the next scene, which was undoubtedly shot weeks later or earlier, Nicholson is humming that song as if it got stuck in his mind when he was in the restaurant. That's the kind of touch that tells you this is a really special movie. The performances are hard to beat and Polanski's direction is probably why people in Hollywood have been unable to condemn him for his personal faults. The powerful man that Gittes comes up against is played by John Huston, legendary director and father of Nicholson's real-life long term lover Angelica Huston. This adds an interesting dimension to the scene they play together. I cannot stress enough that if you haven't seen this movie you must see it soon.

Reds (1981)

Reds was released in December of 1981. That Spring semester the enrollment in Soviet History doubled at Yale. Why, because the Soviet Union has never seemed so sexy before or since than it was in this movie.  A sweeping, beautifully filmed, magnificently acted, tour de force this movie is a must see no matter what your politics are.

Reds is based on the true story of Jack Reed (Warren Beatty), writer journalist and political activist who went to Russia in 1917 to cover the Russian Revolution in person. The movie is based partially on his memoir of that trip, Ten Days that Shook the World. It doesn't limit itself to that trip, however, we see Reed before and after those fateful ten days. The movie examines his role in founding the Communist Party in America and his other trips to and involvement with the early Soviet Union,  ultimately resulting in his being the only American buried in the Kremlin. The movie also focuses on the people in Reed's life beginning with is girlfriend/wife Louise Bryant (Diane Keaton). Their relationship and hers with others including Eugene O'Neill (Jack Nicholson) is where the sexy comes into the movie. The community they were part of in Greenwich village is filled with fascinating characters like famous/infamous anarchist Emma Goldman (Maureen Stapleton), some of whom were interviewed about that time by Beatty and those interviews are interspersed with the scripted drama in the film. Among the testifiers from the period are people like Henry Miller, Adela Rogers St. Johns, Rebecca West and George Jessel. Their comments alone and the chance to actually see them instead of reading about them or by them make the movie worth seeing all by itself.

 Beatty was nominated for writing, acting, directing and producing this picture a feat that he alone has equaled with Heaven Can Wait (although Orson Welles came close with Citizen Kane).  The movie won three Oscars, for Beatty's direction, Maureen's supporting actress performance, and for Vitorio Storaro's cinematography. I would argue that all three were well deserved.  Why didn't it win best picture? Good question, an upset from tiny but brilliant Chariots of Fire is why, but don't let take away from the impressive quality of Reds. From the minute details of the relationships to the vast sweep of landscapes as varied as those covered by the Soviet Union itself it succeeds at all levels.  If all you know of the Soviet Union is Reagan's rhetoric, you owe it to yourself to see how idealistically it came into being - even if those ideals were compromised almost immediately.