Movies (Chinatown | Speedy | Strangers On A Train)

Chinatown

Watched this on a sunny afternoon, which one would think would ruin the noir vibes but no, for Los Angeles is nothing if not painfully bright, even when mired in moral muck. Thought there would be more of well, Chinatown, than some mentions and a final scene. Did go “oh, it’s James Hong” when the butler answered the door. Spent time wondering if it was the 50s, only realized it was the 30s afterwards, and wondered if I should’ve been able to tell from the technology levels alone.

Enjoyed the P.I. vibes a lot - Gittes doing quite well for himself on the cheating spouses business but still unable to resist the nagging water man mystery, getting beat up as he pokes his nose into everything, stealing a scrap of property records, the shots through mirrors and lenses.

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Speedy

Watched the original silent version of this, without any of the talkie bits that were added later. Did not expect actual Babe Ruth. Physical comedy was pretty entertaining, favorite gag was the live crab sliding into the guy’s suit pocket and proceeding to pinch and steal from everyone around him. Did spend the whole Coney Island section thinking, (1) wow, Coney Island rides used to be real wild (2) and people were riding all of those in nice suits and outfits?? Our dude shouldn’t have been worried about the stuff happening to his suit from mishaps alone, he was going down a water log ride in that suit!

The unifying narrative is our main guy making sure his (soon-to-be) father-in-law gets his money’s worth for his horse-drawn streetcar line and doesn’t get bullied out of it by the big railroad boys. Love that one tradesman who is like, well, I fought in the Civil War, let’s use my codewords from back then to signify when to attack.

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Strangers On A Train

Another Hitchcock aka once more watching Farley Granger get pushed around by a guy who wants to fuck him and wants him to do murder.

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