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Premise: A detective who specializes in broken marriages gets in over his head when he's hired to investigate a local Water Department figure.
Directed by: Roman Polanski
Stars: Jack Nicholson * Faye Dunaway * John Huston
Review: One of the best film noir detective movies. Gittes (Nicholson) discovers how corrupt powerful men are cruel and malicious when he investigates his latest case of marital infidelity, a Mr. Mulwray. Discovering that he was hired by a moll who'd been paid to do so, Gittes is confronted by the real Mrs. Mulwray (Dunaway) and the case gets stranger and more complex. Mulwray was involved with his wife's father in business dealings that control most of the water in Los Angeles - and Mulwray quickly ends up dead. Gittes gets hired to find out who did so; when discussing the current goings-on with Cross (Huston) he is then hired to find the girl that Mulwray was having an alleged with.
Facing layers upon layers within the web surrounding Cross, Gittes also has to deal with two thugs - one of which is played by Polanski himself - and his former colleagues in the Los Angeles police department. As he discovers horrible secrets and tries to deal with them, he realizes how powerless he is when confronted by the manipulating Cross.
The dialogue is snappy. Nicholson at the top of his game. Huston is menacing from the moment you meet him even while trying to hide it. Dunaway is perfect as the desperate dame. The movie is superb and unforgettable.
Overall: Good
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