Daily Dialogue — October 4, 2012

GITTES: As little as possible.
ESCOBAR: What’s that? What’s that? You wanna do your partner a BIG favor? Take him home. TAKE HIM HOME! Just get him the hell out of here! Go home, Jake. I’m doing you a favor.
WALSH: Forget it Jake, it’s Chinatown.

— Gittes (Jack Nicholson), Escobar (Perry Lopez), Walsh (Joe Mantell), Chinatown (1974), written by Robert Towne

The Daily Dialogue theme for the week is All Is Lost, suggested by Teddy Pasternak. Today’s suggestion by Def Earz.

Trivia: Roman Polanski eliminated Jake Gittes’ voiceover narration, which was written in the script, and filmed the movie so that the audience discovered the clues at the same time Gittes did.

Dialogue On Dialogue: Commentary by Def Earz: “The reason this movie has such devastating impact is it has TWO all is lost moments…. the “she’s my sister, she’s my daughter” scene where Gittes realizes how badly he’s misunderstood the situation, and this one, where he realizes he’s screwed up in exactly the same manner as he did before… “As little as possible” is a call-back to another scene where he tells Evelyn about his past mistake in Chinatown, with both unaware that he’ll shortly do the same thing and that she’ll pay the price.”