1. conglomeration of predominantly chinese businesses and culture.
(Other ethnicities have other "districts," for example, Little Tokyo would be comprised of mostly japanese businesses.)
2. A drama thriller made in 1974 directed by Roman Polanski and staring Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway about drought-ridden '30s L.A., corruption, weird family relations, and a divorce specializing private detective; spawned the phrase "it's Chinatown" - the phrase is used to refer to a situation that is impossible to deal with due to the fact that it is the result of issues imbedded in a tangled web of too many people's personal problems and/or ambitions, greed, or deviance, and that there is nothing one person on the outside of that web can do to set everything right because the whole situation is too fucked up.
Chinatown is a district in San Francisco. You can get anything if you pay enough for it. Swords, knives, lighters. The Chinese dudes behind the counters will always try to squeeze you money out of you, so deal with them with the word "No."
A place where you can throw firecrackers at old people without getting in much trouble. Its also full of skanky little Chinese restaurants. A lot of weird shit happens in Chinatown.
From the 1974 Roman Polanski film written by Robert Towne and starring Jack Nicholson. Chinatown refers to a situation in which helping makes things worse; an unintended consequence the exact opposite of what was desired; a trauma that keeps repeating itself; a character flaw that keeps re-emerging.
"Aid Syrianrebels and stop Assad? Forget it, the whole region is Chinatown."
