It's an exquisite short story about a mood, and a time, and a couple of guys who are blind-sided by love.

Jack Nicholson's impressive, convoluted and moody sequel to Chinatown. [10 Aug 1990]

This is a worthy successor to Chinatown - full of ecological and geological insights into Los Angeles history that recall Raymond Chandler and Ross MacDonald and give a view of southern California that could have been conceived only by a native.

The Two Jakes is well-acted and looks fabulous, cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond paints it eerily bright and shiny.

A lovingly assembled cast in a brilliantly detailed production, with special notice to Vilmos Zsigmond's haunting cinematography, which seems somehow to have captured the light as it was, pre-smog. [10 Aug 1990]

The Two Jakes is competent and watchable.

The Two Jakes turns out to be a surprisingly rich movie - if you're willing to spend 138 minutes on what is essentially a psychological study. [10 Aug 1990]

The Two Jakes is an interesting movie and audiences are predisposed to warm up to Nicholson the actor, but they may not be so charitable to Nicholson the director. [10 Aug 1990]

The Two Jakes itself is less tragic than petulant, mired in a self-pitying remembrance of things past. [10 Aug 1990]

Towne doesn't weave all the elements as deftly as before, and his political observations seem secondhand.

What it lacks are the dramatic underpinnings and emotional core that made the original film an engrossing mystery as well as a cinema classic.

This oft-delayed sequel proves a jumbled, obtuse yet not entirely unsatisfying follow-up to Chinatown, rightly considered one of the best films of the 1970s.

Robert Towne's screenplay is less opportunistic than many of his efforts in recent years, although it still contains moments designed merely to shock or titillate.

The film as a whole is simply an interesting and amusing mess. [10 Aug 1990]