CineFile – Chinatown

Some great films enter the culture, above and beyond their artistry, by striking emblematic gold. In an image, a scene, a line, they make an essential statement that the audience loves both for its insight and its expression. Roman Polanski‘s Chinatown has at least two of those emblematic expressions. One is found in Faye Dunaway‘s Evelyn […]

CineFile – Five Easy Pieces

It isn’t the most famous scene in the film – that would be holding the chicken between her knees – but it is the film’s most emotionally naked, its thematic center. As Jack Nicholson’s Bobby Dupea reveals himself to his stricken, speechless father, played by William Challee, whose apparently compassionate face bears, in its unresponsive […]