1937; cocky private investigator J.J. Gittes (Jack Nicholson) becomes embroiled in a byzantine scandal surrounding the murder of Hollis Mulwray, chief engineer for the LA Department of Water & Power. Polanski’s brilliantly constructed masterpiece gradually exposes layers of intrigue involving Hollis’s enigmatic widow Evelyn (Faye Dunaway), and Noah Cross (a sulphurous John Huston), the dead man’s powerful former partner, and living embodiment of moral corruption and decay.

Notes by David O’Mahony

Screening as part of the Faye Dunaway season.