Plot Synopsis (continued)
As Gittes drives his convertible through an area marked
by NO TRESPASSING signs, men on horseback fire on Gittes' car in
the middle of one orange grove, and then pursue him through the narrow
rows of trees. He is dragged from his crashed (and overheating) automobile,
beaten (his nose bloodied), and his pockets emptied. The leader of
the farmers wonders which of two hated groups Gittes represents and
misdirects his anger at him: "Who are you with? The water department
or the real estate office?" Gittes identifies himself as a private
investigator, hired by a client "to see if the water department
was irrigatin' your land." The shotgun-armed farmer is flabbergasted
- the exact reverse is happening:
Irrigatin' my land? The water department's been sending
you people out here to blow up water tanks. They put poison down
three of my wells. I call that a funny way to irrigate. Who'd hire
you for a thing like that?
Gittes now understands why the farmers are defending
themselves - corrupt water officials have diverted irrigation water
to cause a drought in some parts of the valley to force farmers out
of the arid areas. And then they buy up their parched land at cut-rate
prices and irrigate selectively. When he hands over Mrs. Mulwray's
contract, one of the farmers is antagonistic:
"Mulwray! That's the son-of-a-bitch who's done it to us." Gittes
is knocked out cold when he calls the man a "dumb Okie" [a
displaced migrant worker/farmer recently-arrived in California after
being foreclosed.]
He regains consciousness with Mrs. Mulwray, his "employer" staring
down at him, as he is surrounded by the farmers on a Northwest Valley
porch. [This is Gittes' first rescue by Mrs. Mulwray. She
was summoned by the farmer who found her name in his wallet.] As
they drive back to town in Mrs. Mulwray's car, Gittes describes the
political scandal to Mrs. Mulwray. He explains how drought-stricken
valley acreage, artificially-created, is being purchased cheaply
by land-grab speculation pending the reservoir's construction. (Water
will eventually be directed to the valley's worthless land, making
it extremely valuable.) Hollis was killed because he opposed the
construction of the reservoir:
Gittes: That dam's a con-job...The one your husband
opposed. They're conning LA into building it, but the water's not
gonna go to LA. It's comin' right here.
Mrs. Mulwray: To the valley.
Gittes: Everything you can see, everything around us. I was at the
Hall of Records today. In the last three months, Robert Knox has
bought seven thousand acres, Emma Dill twelve thousand, Clarence
Spear five thousand, and Jasper Lamar Crabb twenty-five thousand
acres...They're blowin' these farmers out of their land and then
pickin' it up for peanuts. You have any idea what this land would
be worth with a steady water supply? About thirty million more than
they paid for it.
Mrs. Mulwray: Hollis knew about this?
Gittes: That's why he was killed.
Something clicks in Gittes' memory about Jasper Lamar
Crabb - his newspaper obituary column is in his pocket (at Ida Sessions'
suggestion). A memorial service was recently held at the Mar Vista
Inn for Crabb who died two weeks earlier. A fraudulent land swindle
is in progress with phony names turning up on deeds of sale. Dummy,
unwitting investors, including some who are penniless, senile or
deceased, are the new proprietors-owners who are buying up the valley
land. Gittes explains to Mrs. Mulwray: "He passed away two weeks
ago, and one week ago, he bought the land. That's unusual."
They join forces and drive into the Mar Vista Rest
Home and then enter, with another of Gittes' skillfully untruthful
deceptions or pretensions. They misrepresent themselves as a rich
couple who need to find a convalescent home for Gittes' dad. The
unethical, anti-Semitic home director, Mr. Palmer (John Rogers) assures
them that Jews are excluded and that strict privacy is maintained
for all residents. On an activities board for the home, Gittes finds
familiar names: "They're all there - every goddamn name. You're
looking at the owners of the 50 thousand acre empire...They may not
know it but they are." Some of the elderly residents (including
a landless and poor woman named Emma Dill (Cecil Elliott)) are sewing
a flag with the fish symbol of the Albacore Club, since Mar Vista
is an "unofficial
charity of theirs." [Cross is a patron of the Rest Home!]
Turning wise to their scheme, Palmer requests that
they follow him out, and Mulvihill greets them in the lobby. After
first urging Mrs. Mulwray to her car, Gittes beats up Mulvihill.
As he leaves, he is rescued just in time from the nose-cutting thug
when Mrs. Mulwray wheels into the driveway with the car. [This is
her second rescue of him.] In a quick getaway, Gittes leaps onto
her car, as they both avoid bullets that hit the windshield. [This
is a foreshadowing of the final scene of the film.]
At the Mulwray mansion that evening, all the servants
have purposely been given "the night off" by Mrs. Mulwray.
Thinking that he has asked "an innocent question" about
how deserted the place is, she observes that his questions are never
to be taken at face value: "No question from you is innocent,
Mr. Gittes." She mentions that his afternoon and evening have
been fraught with danger, and wonders if this is typical of his whole
life: "If this is how you go about your work, I'd say you'd
be lucky to, uh, get through a whole day." Gittes mentions his
past, dangerous police work for the district attorney in the alien,
inscrutable, mysterious world of Chinatown when he did "as little
as possible" - that was the last time he had experienced similar
dangers.
Gittes changes the subject about why he left the police
force in Chinatown by asking for some peroxide for his bruised nose.
He removes his bandage in the bathroom, causing Mrs. Mulwray to exclaim
at the ugly, naked wound: "God! It's a nasty cut. I had no idea." While
she dabs on the peroxide, he notices that she has a black speck in
the green part of her eye. She confesses that there is an imperfection
in her vision: "Oh, that. It's uh, it's a fl-flaw in the iris...Yes,
uh, it's a sort of birthmark." After visually exposing their
flaws or deficiencies, their faces are so intimately close to each
other that they kiss.
A post-coital scene shows them naked in bed and leisurely
smoking cigarettes. Wanting to know more about his past, a loving,
less urgent Mrs. Mulwray finds that he is reluctant to speak about
his past in Chinatown - where "you can't always tell what's
goin' on." [This is the clearest statement of the film's theme
- that Chinatown is the locus of unforeseen tragedy.] But he finally
reveals to her that with good intentions, he had tried to prevent
something terrible from happening there to a woman he cared for,
only to hasten the tragedy. This caused him to quit the police force
- his life was changed forever. [His interference for the sake of
a woman in his past is doomed to repeat itself by the film's conclusion.
As his detective friend had cautioned, he should have done "as
little as possible."]:
Mrs. Mulwray: Why does it bother you to talk about
it?
Gittes: It bothers everybody that works there.
Mrs. Mulwray: Where?
Gittes: Chinatown, everybody. To me, it was just bad luck.
Mrs. Mulwray: Why?
Gittes: You can't always tell what's goin' on - like with you.
Mrs. Mulwray: Why was, uhm, why was it bad luck?
Gittes: I was trying to keep someone from being hurt. I ended up
making sure that she was hurt.
Mrs. Mulwray: Cherchez la femme? Was there a woman involved?
Gittes: Of course.
Mrs. Mulwray: Dead?
Before he can respond, the phone rings, and she answers
it with worry and concern in her voice after being told something
troubling. Anguished, she replies cryptically: "Look, don't
do anything. Don't do anything till I get there." After hanging
up the phone, she insists that the call has "nothing to do" with
Gittes, but she has to leave immediately (the call divides them irrevocably
because he doesn't trust her) - she withholds her destination and
her reasons for a hasty exit. When he tells her that he saw her
father, she calls Cross "dangerous" and "crazy":
Mrs. Mulwray: Don't be angry. It has nothing to do
with you or with any or all of this...Please, trust me this much!
(She kisses him.) I'll be back. There is, uh, there is something
that I should tell you about. The uh, the fishing club that old
lady mentioned, uhm. The pieces of the flag...
Jake: The Albacore Club.
Mrs. Mulwray: It, it, it has to do with my father.
Jake: I know.
Mrs. Mulwray: He, he owns it. You know?
Jake: I saw him. (Mrs. Mulwray shrinks down and covers her naked
breasts with her arms when her father is mentioned.)
Mrs. Mulwray: You saw - - my fa-father?...When?
Jake: This morning.
Mrs. Mulwray: You didn't tell me.
Jake: Well, there hasn't been much time.
Mrs. Mulwray: But, uh, what, what did he say? What did he say?
Jake: That you were jealous. That he was afraid of what you might
do...Mulwray's girlfriend for one. He wanted to know where she was.
Mrs. Mulwray (kneeling by his side): I want you to listen to me.
Now, my father is a very dangerous man. You don't know how dangerous.
You don't know how crazy.
Jake: Are you trying to tell me that he might be behind all this?
Mrs. Mulwray: It's possible.
Jake: Even the death of your husband?
Mrs. Mulwray: It's possible. Now, please, don't ask me any more questions
now. Just wait. Wait for me here. I need you here.
She showers and then leaves. Although strictly told
not to follow her, Gittes disobeys her. He 'borrows' her husband's
car and trails after her to an unfamiliar, modest house with the
porch light on. (He made it easy to follow her in the dark by sneaking
outside and kicking out the red cover from her right car tail-light.)
While hiding outdoors, he watches through a side window with a half-drawn
curtain as she first talks to her Chinese butler. In another room,
he spies her late husband's visibly upset young blonde 'mistress'
lying down on a bed (and being guarded, held or abused against her
will?). Mrs. Mulwray forcibly administers drugs (sedatives, narcotics?)
after they have conversed.
Jake sits in Mrs. Mulwray's front car seat when she
returns to her car - she is startled and a bit angry to see him after
his betrayal. Now in his investigative mode (only a few hours after
having made love to her), he has concluded that she is involved in
criminal activity, but what he has seen is inconclusive. [His earlier
words to her haunt us - "you can't always tell what's goin'
on."] She tells him that her "husband's girlfriend"
is actually her sister, who is upset at having learned of her husband's
death:
Jake: Come on, Mrs. Mulwray. You've got your husband's
girlfriend tied up in there.
Mrs. Mulwray: She's not tied up.
Jake: You know what I mean. You're holdin' her against her will.
Mrs. Mulwray: I am not.
Jake: OK. Then let's go talk to her.
Mrs. Mulwray: NO! She's, she's too upset.
Jake: What about?
Mrs. Mulwray: Hollis' death. I-I-I tried to keep it from her. I didn't
want her to know until I could make plans for us to leave.
Jake: You mean she just found out about it? (She nods.) It's not
what it looks like, Mrs. Mulwray.
Mrs. Mulwray: What does it look like?
Jake: Like she knows more than you want her to tell.
Mrs. Mulwray: You're insane.
Jake: Just tell me the truth. I'm not the police. I don't care what
you've done. I don't want to hurt you.
Mrs. Mulwray: You won't go to the police if I tell you?
Jake: I will if you don't.
Mrs. Mulwray: (She puts her head down, and accidentally honks the
car's horn before divulging a crucial secret.) Sh-she's my sister.
Jake: Take it easy. She's your sister - she's your sister. Why all
the secrecy?
Mrs. Mulwray: I can't...(anguished)
Jake: Is it because of Hollis? Because she was seeing your husband?
Is that it?
Mrs. Mulwray: I would never have harmed Hollis. He was the most gentle,
decent man imaginable. And he, he put up with more from me than you'll
ever know. I wanted him to be happy. (She begins crying.)
Jake doesn't know whether to believe her or not - that
she "would never have harmed Hollis." He leaves her car
and she quickly asks: "Aren't you going - coming back with me?" He
declines but assures her: "Don't worry. I'm not gonna tell anybody
about this." She has again been misinterpreted his detachment: "That's
not what I meant." He bids her goodnight: "Yeah. Well,
uh, I'm tired, Mrs. Mulwray. Good night."
That night after showering in his own home, Jake restlessly
lies on his bed. He hesitates to pick up the incessantly-ringing
phone. Two phone calls by an anonymous caller [later identified as
Loach] summon him to Ida Sessions' house. Early the next morning,
Jake drives to the house's location and finds broken glass in the
front door window. Inside on the kitchen floor, Ida's dead body is
sprawled amidst spilled groceries. He flips through the contents
of her wallet and finds a $2 dollar bill, an identification card,
her Social Security Card and Screen Actor's Guild card. Ex-colleagues
Escobar and Loach confront him - in the frame-up - with a flashlight
beam from inside a darkened bathroom: "Find anything interesting,
Gittes? What are you doin' around here?"
They suspect that Gittes knows her or had something to do with her
murder, because his phone number is written on her kitchen wall next
to the phone. Loach and Gittes exchange a male/female sexual insult
about his professional snooping (with his phallic-nose) into people's
bedrooms, with a retaliatory reply about how Loach's wife has a lethal
vagina:
Loach: What happened to your nose, Gittes? Somebody
slam a bedroom window on it?
Gittes: Nope, your wife got excited. She crossed her legs a little
too quick. You understand what I mean, pal?
Gittes is accused by Escobar, who has supposedly figured
everything out, of having worked for Ida Sessions (they found the
pictures he took and sent to her of Hollis at Echo Park in the rowboat
with the girl). The detective then followed Mulwray until he was
found murdered. Gittes is then told one tantalizing bit of unknown
evidence (that Mulwray drowned with "saltwater"
in his lungs, indicating that he did not die where his body was found
in the fresh-water reservoir), when Escobar accuses Evelyn of being
her husband's murderer, with Gittes as an "accessory
after the fact."
This broad hired you. Not Evelyn Mulwray...Somebody
wanted to shake Mulwray down. She hired you. That's how come you
found out he was murdered...Mulwray had saltwater in his lungs.
You were following him day and night. You saw who killed him. You
even took pictures of it. It was Evelyn Mulwray and she's been
paying you off like a slot machine ever since.
Other false accusations made against Gittes include "conspiracy,
and extortion - minimum." Gittes defends Evelyn Mulwray's innocence
after telling Escobar that he is "dumber" than he thinks.
Jake explains his theory of how Hollis' body was deliberately moved
to the reservoir to divert attention from the ocean, although he
was actually killed by the salt-water ocean where the water was being
dumped:
What do you think? Evelyn Mulwray knocked off her
husband in the ocean, then dragged him up to a reservoir 'cause
she thought it would look more like an accident? Mulwray was murdered
and moved because somebody didn't want his body found in the ocean...He
found out they were dumpin' water there. That's what they were
tryin' to cover up.
When Gittes can't prove his point, he takes the police
to the isolated run-off location where water was being dumped nightly.
Yelburton, now the new water commissioner, is reported to have confirmed
Jake's contention with a twist:
"There's irrigation in the valley, and there's always a little
run-off after they do that. And he says Gittes knows this and he's
been goin' around makin' irresponsible accusations all last week." To
Jake's way of thinking, Escobar is implicated in the conspiracy with
Yelburton and the lieutenant fears bucking the department's criminal
activities - he "wants to hang onto his little gold bar." And
he fears that Escobar may cause him to lose his own detective's license.
Gittes is given two hours to present himself and his "client"-suspect
Evelyn (suspected of Hollis' murder) at Escobar's office.
Gittes enters the Mulwray mansion where he finds signs
that the house is being closed up in preparation for a trip - the
maid is covering furniture with white sheets. In the garden patio
area, the gardener repeats his frustration - but adds two more words: "Salt
water - very bad for glass." Gittes suddenly stops short with
insight and clear vision - he realizes that the water in the estate's
fishpond is salt water [what was found in Hollis' lungs].
He asks the gardener to fish out the sparkling object he had seen
earlier but didn't have time to fish out. The object is a pair of
cracked spectacles [Hollis' glasses?], leading Gittes to assume that
Hollis was drowned by Evelyn in their domestic salt-water fishpond,
and then his body was dragged to the reservoir. And he fears that
Evelyn is planning to flee the scene with the crime's only witness
- the young girl, and ultimately, she will frame him as an accessory
to the murder.
Racing to the house where the young girl is hidden,
Gittes finds a breathless Evelyn rushing to pack in order to catch
a 5:30 pm train. He first demands to see "the girl" and
then without explaining why, Gittes phones and summons Lieutenant
Escobar to their location (1972 Canyon Drive) to turn her in. He
then asks Evelyn: "You know any good criminal lawyers?" He
is determined to force information from her about everything he believes
she has been concealing about her husband's murder. |