Word: nicholson
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...THIS BUSINESS," says Jack Nicholson--as J.J. "Jake" Gittis, private detective specializing in marriage difficulties, flushing his suave taunting smile and slender silver cigarette case--"you gotta have finesse." Nicolson does. And so, in this business of making thirties atmosphere detective thrillers, does Roman Polanski. He's made Chinatown the best film so far this year, an unpretentious homage to thirties detective flicks, the kind of tense story where the reviewer forgets to take notes about half-way through...
...Last Detail is one of two Jack Nicholson films playing at the Harvard Sq. Theater through Tuesday. In it Nicholson gives a marvellous performance, and even if this recent film is scratchy and a bit simplistic it's worth seeing in a slow movie year like this. It's playing with The King of Marvin Gardens, sort of an obscure sequel to Five Easy Pieces: Nicholson's existential Atlantic City trip...
...during that time long ago that Chinatown, an exotic and cunning entertainment, takes place. It is very much molded, too, in the Chandler style, intricately written by Robert Towne and directed by Roman Polanski with a sort of edgy placidity that breaks into moments of sudden violence. Jack Nicholson, sporting a sort of drowsy panache, appears as a private investigator named J.J. Gittis, hired to tail the Los Angeles water commissioner, who is suspected by his wife of being unfaithful. But the commissioner is soon victim of a highly unlikely accident, dead of a fall into a reservoir drain...
Dead-End Beat. Where the movie works less well is in characterization. Nicholson's Gittis is a clever piece of acting, funny and winning, but Polanski and Towne do not give him the chance to get into any depth. Gittis is a nickel-and-dimer trying to boost himself into the big time. He wears sharp, fussy suits and throws out a line of bright chatter. But there are still times when he sounds like the dumb cop on the deadend Chinatown beat. All this is fine, but it is all there is. Chandler made Philip Marlowe into...
...Portrait of Marriage, Nicholson...