Chinatown is another Classic Hollywood film that I've continually put off watching for years. What makes it more ironic is that I love to write screenplays and short stories and Chinatown is revered for being the greatest screenplay ever written. But for whatever reason, as much as I study the craft of writing, I never did get around to dissecting or at least watching the film that boast having the best ever.

So, does the legacy live up to the hype? I dunno to be honest. I can see that back in the day, the script written by Robert Towne was definitely ahead of it's time with all the twist and turns. But 35 years later, I have seen and read some of the best ever and quite a few of them since Chinatown came out are very complicated scripts that make you think, which is what I prefer. Now this may sound like I'm belittling Chinatown. That couldn't be further from the truth. I really enjoyed the characters, the story and the acting, particularly Jack Nicholson. What I'm saying is that I think the legacy of the screenplay has been built up so much that I was expecting even more twist and turns, or something beyond than what I think is a good, solid mystery story.

This is still a great film and one that I can easily recommend as a Rent for sure, if not an outright Buy to add to your DVD collection. If there is one criticism I have with the film, it's the ending. I won't go into detail for those that have never seen this either. But lets just say that the ending was at the insistence of Roman Polanski and not Robert Towne, who had written a different ending.