Robert Towne

When I first saw that, I was like, that's it? arrest the guy arrest noah cross he just he he his daughter he's gonna get away like he he shot her he did horrible things to her he's gonna get away with it no jack nicholson's this awesome private eye he's gonna get him at the end he's gotta walk away from it because of something that happened in chinatown that we never really know and i i love this movie I love this story.

Robert Towne, great story.

Roman Polanski makes great movies.

Sorry.

I'm surprised I loved it.

But that's Robert Towne, isn't it? It's going to be Robert Towne, because it's going to be about the dialogue.

But I would have been about eight or nine.

And it's not the type of thing that I would have loved.

And there's a few decent pieces on there as well.

Some new interviews with some of those involved.

And a really good appreciation of Robert Towne as well by Lucy Bolton.

And like Last Boy Scout, like The Monster Squad, a really meaty booklet.

I guess I can understand.

Robert Towne said nobody knows anything about making a successful film, whereas I am now saying we need to murder people with a hammer.

like we need to stop this yeah what the fuck are we doing

i like patrick wilson and insidious too um yeah no i i could see why the red door would be the most highest grossing because it's it's like oh it all ends here like it's just one of those it's an end game sort of thing yes oh it's all been leading to this moment and this moment unfortunately is

yeah there should be like a limit of like if it's over five years it should just be

like a nickel or free anyway that article did mention that it was uh Robert Towne is the person kind of responsible for Curtis Hanson getting to direct this.

That's a pretty good person to have in your corner.

Robert Towne, who, depending on the source, let's see, the Dallas Observer in an article published September 11th, 1997, wrote that that was done to promote LA Confidential, but then touched on Hanson's career as a whole.

said that Robert Towne, an acquaintance from his days on his Uncle Jack's tennis courts, godfathered it, the bedroom window, into production with Hanson at the helm.

The South Florida Sun Sentinel says that Hanson met Robert Towne on the set of Bonnie and Clyde, because Robert Towne supposedly did uncredited rewrites on Bonnie and Clyde.

And Curtis Hanson got to go visit the set because he was the photographer who found Faye Dunaway.

So that's how they met.

The lighting looked good.

Robert Towne writes in direct.

Robert

Towne? Raul Julia, I turned it on.

And to your point of how you said you don't realize it as you're there, but by the end you look back only then.

I mean, you see that it's all Robert Towne in that case is setting it all up.

She's accidentally hitting her head on the car horn or, you know what I mean? Stuff that pays off later until the shocking conclusion.

Exactly.

And-

Robert Towne?

Robert Towne wrote and directed Tequila Sunrise, and it's, it's, it's like a, it's like an old-fashioned Hollywood s- movie star driven story.

But for whatever reason, I've always loved the movie, and it's never looked very good on home video.

Looks amazing on...

Yeah.

You could have worse heroes than Robert Towne.

Yeah.

I remember, by the way, it is an amazing film.

And I was

like a punk ass fool in high school, like who saw Tequila Sunrise and stuff.

And I was like, who is this Robert Towne? Everyone says he's one of the greatest writers of all time.

These are cheesy Hollywood movies.

Um, this is one of those movies that, yeah, I saw it as a kid of course but barely remembered it.

I knew it was, you know, they r- sort of re-engineered Top Gun, but they brought on Robert Towne-

Yes

... to try to give it a little-

He wants a screenplay that builds a massive empire on the page.

Yes, and when someone is outraged that Robert Towne's script for Chinatown, which by the way is universally lauded for its airtight, relentlessly cynical mystery structure, is placed above the romantic sacrifice of Casablanca, they are really engaging in a philosophical debate.

It's deeply philosophical.

Do you value the bleak structural perfection of a neo-noir where the systems of power are completely corrupt? Or do you value a screenplay that utilizes classical structure to affirm human decency and idealism in the face of war?