# "Forget It, Jake; It's Chinatown" **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 17, 2003, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003 "2003-10-17T14:01:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2003, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/21 "2003-10-17T21:37:23Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Wumpus \* > \*\*Lissner, I think you should give Chinatown another try. It’s not about Hollywood at all, and the noir genre is just the medium through which it delivers its messages about capitalism, power, family and the irreversible decay of the American Dream. > > In fact, Chinatown is about many of the same things the Godfather is about, but seen from another angle. We see the Corlene family from the inside, but the Mulwray family is seen only from the point of view of an outside observer. > > Chinatown hits harder than the Godfather. While Coppola clucks his tongue at Vito and Michael, the movie still admires them: they Get Things Done and fight for “the family”. Chinatown, on the other hand, makes it abundantly clear that Mulwray is a complete and utter monster who views the entire world as his toy. > > Chinatown also has a darker worldview. The observer character in The Godfather is Kaye, who starts out fresh and innocent–suggesting a world where innocence is possible. The observer character in Chinatown, on the other hand, is Jake. He already views himself as being tough and cynical and thoroughly knowlegable in the evil that men do – and then the movie proceeds to show Jake that he doesn’t understand the half of it. > > Re: The Birds: maybe Ilsa thinks of it as a horror or disaster movie, not realizing that the influence runs from The Birds to those genres and not the other way around? \*\* Hmm. I think Coppola’s “clucking” as opposed to Polanski’s demonizing makes Godfather a more ambiguous movie, and Chinatown a shallower one. And I can still see “the education of Jake Gittes” as simply out-noiring noir; the exaggeration seems entirely an exaggeration of _noir_ and not of _life_. It’s hard for me to see Chinatown as anything but an unquestionably brilliant postmodern bauble. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2003, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/22 "2003-10-17T22:18:37Z")
What does the little Hassidim have to do with _Chinatown_? ---
**Author:** ![Ilsa\_Lund](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/a6a055/32.png) [@Ilsa\_Lund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ilsa_Lund)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2003, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/23 "2003-10-17T22:19:56Z")
Highligh it!😃 ---
**Author:** ![Winston\_Bongo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a9adbd/32.png) [@Winston\_Bongo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Winston_Bongo)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 10:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/24 "2003-10-18T10:27:58Z")
Possibly stupid question time: why was the movie called “Chinatown” anyway? I haven’t seen it in years, but I recall at the time wondering why the hell it was titled something that had, IIRC, nothing to do with the plot and was only mentioned a couple of times. ---
**Author:** ![Winston\_Bongo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a9adbd/32.png) [@Winston\_Bongo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Winston_Bongo)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 10:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/25 "2003-10-18T10:33:00Z")
Possibly stupid question time: why was the movie called “Chinatown” anyway? I haven’t seen it in years, but I recall at the time wondering why the hell it was titled something that had, IIRC, nothing to do with the plot and was only mentioned a couple of times. ---
**Author:** ![look\_ninjas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/b2d939/32.png) [@look\_ninjas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/look_ninjas)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 12:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/26 "2003-10-18T12:13:54Z")
That’s odd. As I recall it, they used the phrase “It’s Chinatown” so much that it began driving me slightly mad. “Forget it, Jake; It’s Chinatown.” “Well, that’s what happens… in Chinatown.” “I’m going to get some bubblegum… in Chinatown.” ---
**Author:** ![Labdad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/439d5e/32.png) [@Labdad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labdad)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/27 "2003-10-18T12:26:43Z")
I think Chinatown is used as a symbol for helplessness. Jake and Escobar used to be on the police force together in Chinatown, where Jake did “as little as possible.” The implication seems to be that no matter how hard you tried to make a difference in Chinatown, you couldn’t, and thus were reduced to doing as little as possible. Until Jake got involved in the Mulwray case, he also seemed to be doing as little as possible, making a decent living as a marital affairs private investigator. He then gets involved up to his teeth, and despite his best efforts, he can’t make any difference. It’s telling that the film ends in Chinatown, and Jake’s last line is “as little as possible,” muttered under his breath. And, of course, the last line in the film is: “Forget it, Jake; it’s Chinatown.” My .02 ---
**Author:** ![Ilsa\_Lund](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/a6a055/32.png) [@Ilsa\_Lund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ilsa_Lund)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/28 "2003-10-18T14:49:15Z")
**lissener**! I wasn’t ignoring your last emails, but they were bounced back to me, saying your account was over quota. ---
**Author:** ![FilmGeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b19c9b/32.png) [@FilmGeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FilmGeek)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/29 "2003-10-18T15:09:52Z")
Labdad is right. I studied this script and film in a screenwriting class. There are so many layers to the story I don’t even know where to begin. Notice how even though he knows Dunaway is dead (etc, etc) he just walks away…you can’t do anything now, it’s just like Chinatown… Read the script. It’s easier to follow than the movie version. ( I don’t know why) ---
**Author:** ![Ilsa\_Lund](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/a6a055/32.png) [@Ilsa\_Lund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ilsa_Lund)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/30 "2003-10-18T15:19:07Z")
CAn we venture as far as to say that it is superior to “The Big Sleep,” kittykat? ---
**Author:** ![Wumpus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8c91f0/32.png) [@Wumpus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wumpus)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/31 "2003-10-18T17:00:00Z")
lissener: the ambiguity of secretly admiring the gangster while ostensibly condemning him is hardly original with the Godfather, though. It’s pretty much a standard part of the gangster formula since the Warner Brothers days. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/32 "2003-10-18T17:18:58Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by lissener \* What came before the Birds that it was derivative of? \*\* “The Wasps” was pretty much on the same theme. In fact, Aristophanes would baisically choose whatever axe he had to grind at the time and give it his trademark polish. Oh - different Birds! Sorry. ---
**Author:** ![Ilsa\_Lund](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/a6a055/32.png) [@Ilsa\_Lund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ilsa_Lund)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/33 "2003-10-18T17:35:22Z")
Hey you! Stop that gyring and gimbling in my thread! It’s not brillig yet! ---
**Author:** ![Nanook](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c57346/32.png) [@Nanook](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nanook)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/34 "2003-10-18T20:06:08Z")
The “Forget it, Jake, It’s Chinatown” line suggests a metaphor for a world of nebulous morality, a gray zone, as it were , where the innocent ( like Evelyn and her daughter) are victimized and the evil ( like Noah Cross) flourish. Such an existential statement is hardly surprising coming from someone like Polanski who lived through the Holocaust ( his mother died in the camps) and whose wife and child suffered gruesome deaths at the hands of Manson and his crew. ---
**Author:** ![Torgo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@Torgo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Torgo)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2003, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/35 "2003-10-18T20:43:06Z")
I believe the script is used in film schools as the ideal way to write a screenplay. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2003, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/36 "2003-10-20T01:52:28Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Nanook \* > \*\*and whose wife and child suffered gruesome deaths at the hands of Manson and his crew. \*\* Nitpick: Not the hands of Manson. Manson ordered the occupants of the house to be killed, but was not there himself. ---
**Author:** ![Never\_to\_be\_Queen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/e9c0ed/32.png) [@Never\_to\_be\_Queen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Never_to_be_Queen)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2003, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/37 "2003-10-20T05:45:05Z")
I first rented Chinatown, thinking it was Big Trouble in Little China. …that was a mistake ---
**Author:** ![Adamcomic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/977dab/32.png) [@Adamcomic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Adamcomic)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2003, 10:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/38 "2003-10-20T10:27:10Z")
Great movie, no doubt. But he is still a predatory pedophile. The girl was 13 and he drugged her first. No excuse for that. ---
**Author:** ![DrMemory](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/977dab/32.png) [@DrMemory](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrMemory)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2003, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/39 "2003-10-20T12:26:49Z")
And Always Remember… Salt Water, Bad for Glass… ---
**Author:** ![Ilsa\_Lund](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/a6a055/32.png) [@Ilsa\_Lund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ilsa_Lund)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2003, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003/40 "2003-10-20T13:45:37Z")
> [@](#): > > Great movie, no doubt. But he is still a predatory pedophile. The girl was 13 and he drugged her first. No excuse for that. How does this have any bearing on his merits as an artist, or the merits of his work? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/forget-it-jake-its-chinatown/208003.md?page=3)