THE MASTER (2012) P.T. Anderson's film on the origions of Scientology (sort of), Starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, Joaquin Phoenix, Amy Adams, and Laura Dern

Also I'm terribly amused by that Mare Island link just above as I lived there from 1979 to 1981 when it was still a Navy base.

stoked for the madness.

― ( •ิ.•ั) (gr8080), Wednesday, August 3, 2011 1:37 AM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

― ice cr?m, Wednesday, August 3, 2011 1:19 AM (7 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

like this idea. would be cool to see what films buffet and gates would throw their money behind.

philip seymour hoffman and joaquin phoenix, laura dern and amy adams

p.t. anderson and, er, himself

Something something or other:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/22/movies/paul-thomas-anderson-film-may-be-about-scientology.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=9oZDKFoCqAw

Worth embedding! Maybe this link will let it happen?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9oZDKFoCqAw&feature=youtu.be

Ah hell. Well, yeah, it looks pretty intriguing. Phoenix almost looks like Fassbender there. Pretty excited.

<3 joaquin

fucking amazing trailer

Was just about to post it. Great, great stuff.

oh hell yes

nice.

YESSSSSSSSSSSSS.

Excellent - can't wait for some Hubbard footage

Rah! Just watched it twice through. I'm stoked.

the only way i could be more psyched for this is if there are aleister crowley & jack parsons analogues in the movie because their association w/ the hubb

that is pretty much exactly what a trailer should be. hope the movie is that good!

xpost -- got that goddamn right

the only way i could be more psyched for this is if there are aleister crowley & jack parsons analogues in the movie because their association w/ the hubb

omg what if

is he making a boob out of sand?

how would you rate your overall health?

strrrong

Actually you know, what if the whole supposition has been a bit of a blind and it IS all about Hubbard/Parsons/Crowley rather than just Hubbard straight up? The time period is right given the look of the trailer, and it suits the title.

will lose my shit if there's a Parsons (or Crowley) analogue in this

amy adams as marjorie cameron???

http://www.johncoulthart.com/feuilleton/wp-content/uploads/2007/01/cameron.jpg

probably not tho!

radiohead's jonny greenwood is doing the score for this, for those who care about such things. i thought he did a fantastic job with both There Will Be Blood and Norwegian Wood.

was there ever a movie made about parsons? that entire story with the three of them is so bonkers

I thought the music in that trailer sounded very similar to Greenwood's TWBB score.

tbh i would watch this for the wrestling seamen alone #pvmic

i almost auditioned to be an extra in that scene!!!

gr8080, mind if I change the year in the thread title now that it has a 2012 release date?

by all means, and change this to 2013 while you're at it:

TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES MICHAEL BAY REBOOT (2014)

thanks!

sorry if that's an annoying habit, i just really hate the "anticipate" meme in movie thread titles

i almost auditioned to be an extra in that scene!!!

Jeez, man, you could have snuck in a 77 tattoo or something into the film and blown minds.

i saw a girl with a 77 tattoo on saturday!!

i came very close to asking if i could take a photo

Phoenix looks like he's aged 40 years and had a stroke in that. Someone in the comments says he should get an Oscar for the trailer alone.

why is this not at cannes? is it not finished? awesome trailer.

Via Deadline.com, speaking of Cannes:

The three films highlighted tonight will be released in succession this fall with The Master (starring Joaquin Phoenix in a return to films , Philip Seymour Hoffman and Amy Adams) involving a complex plot dealing with a scientology-related religion (and obviously destined for controversy) opening in October . Tonight’s presentation was more detailed but Deadline unveiled the first teaser earlier today....About four minutes were shown...None of these films were obviously easy to excerpt, and all look like works in progress although Weinstein told me The Master is nearly finished.

it is almost certainly not finished

xp

PTA cut the trailer together himself I think; we mention that yet?

it definitely has his touch.

Did anyone else read this thread title as "the MASTER P film on the origins of scientology..."

SP: Da Last Don

damn that looks good

wow, that's a great trailer

The trailer's intriguing, as is the Wes Anderson, and scientology's a great subject. I'll approach both films hoping for the best, but aware that, for me, they've never equaled Boogie Nights or Rushmore.

stoked

man I think There Will Be Blood is superior to Boogie Nights in every way

that got me doing a little googlin' and so i came across this delightful sentence:

Well that's an excellent question because we see people accidentally swallowing gasoline all the time, I mean it's a daily occurrence here in Utah and the important thing to know is that if you swallow gasoline and it goes down to your stomach, it's really not that big of a deal, other than you're going to be burping gasoline for about 24 hours, that's not real tasty, but it will keep going, it's not absorbed very well in your gut.

what are people doing in utah? siphoning gasoline, it turns out

just utah stuff

Loved this movie, I see it sometimes described as a buddy movie and I guess it sorta is

Utah has restrictive alcohol laws so if you find yourself with a hangover on Sunday morning, unleaded 87 might be the only buzz in town

Utah State Song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUA9FUTieKA

at its heart it's the "me and my bro goofing around" movie

― mh, Wednesday, April 1, 2020 10:00 AM (three years ago) bookmarkflaglink

I liked their relationship, just two guys who want to have adventures surrounded by a band of joyless pedants.

― lag∞n, Monday, October 1, 2012 6:23 AM (eleven years ago)

Laura Dern does some of the best acting that has ever been done in the one little scene where she quizzes PSH about the nonsense and he yells "what do you want from me, Helen!?" at her, and she turns away shattered

I saw this in the theatre with my mom. She’s really into salacious Scientology scandals and isn’t super into “high brow” film. Her paraphrased review: “I didn’t know it was just going to be about.. two guys being guys”

she gets it

I think it worked better as a metaphor for Scientology.. that way they can't complain about little errors in the details

And PSH's character was sympathetic at times, whereas Hubbard was a deluded pervert monster

Reading a really interesting book on the Sullivanians, a cult-like commune out of New York from the '60s right through to the '90s.

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374600396/thesullivanians

They're not mentioned in this thread. Anyone who knows the origins of PTA's film better than I do, is there any connection there?

Watching this for the first time now.

My favorite PTA film, and also one Hoffman's finest performances... be interested to hear your take tomorrow

(I'm biased because it's obviously very California-centric)

i havent rewatched this is ages, i need to give it another spin

its so good

fellas, is it gay to just want to drink rocket fuel with your bro until your brain sizzles

just bros being bros

Last posted on this in 2016, when I saw it for a third time (or second; I posted about drifting for 30 minutes the first time). So this was my fourth time. Or third.

"still not sure what it's trying to say"--me, 2016.

Still not sure--me, 2025. I actually thought of Mad Men tonight, which I hadn't seen when The Master came out (but had finished by 2016). Two stories about how men of roughly the same age dealt with the war when they got home. Anyway, after feeling more positive about the film after that third viewing, this time I reversed course again. Hoffman's very good, and Anderson has that John Ford/George Stevens feel for wide open spaces. But it all felt very muddled. Amy Adams has kind of a nothing role. And Phoenix's performance again struck me as very affectatious. Impressive, in a way, but I think he's been better in other films since. It was interesting to me to see Jesse Plemons and Rami Malek in prominent roles; would have had no idea who they were in 2012.

I like it better than Phantom Thread for sure, but not as much as There Will Be Blood.

What makes it slightly better than Phantom Thread?

Philip Seymour Hoffman beats DDL any day

His second-least-successful after Dogs, for me, but still wholly conceived and apprehensible. The minor weaknesses are a failure to commit to an alternate character / timeline for the elements that aren’t Hubbard, and Phoenix’ performance coming unmoored as it proceeds, whether from the former (PSH’s substitute by design doesn’t give the audience enough to believe that a cult of personality could compel the virile, directed Phoenix*), or Phoenix himself not finding his own character reprehensible enough to commit to portraying (probably the latter, given his turns in Vice and Eddington).

Phantom Thread is so distinct a portrait of a time, a personality, and two-to-several relationships, that it stands head, shoulders and sandy nipples above The Master for me - but I saw each on 70mm ad haven’t rescreened either, thinking streaming unfair by comparison.

*JP has made a career of this since — the leaning in makes one wonder how much was mere technique and whether his characters performance here is top-level silly fun.

Have you watched Phoenix in You Were Never Really Here? No commitment problems.

I'll take Lewis' performance in Phantom Thread any day over PSH's hamming in The Master. Lewis is helped by a better script, but he does a much better job of performing three-dimensional human with layers and interiority. Hoffman and Phoenix just both feel like they're having an acting contest in The Master, to me. It reminds me of Husbands more than anything else - they’re sure acting A Lot, but a lot of it ends up feeling like hot air and wheel-spinning.

an acting contest? idk. i think they're just in love

L. Ron Hubbard was a ham, I mean c’mon

uh i love Husbands and I love the Master. Probably prefer There Will Be Blood but it's apples and oranges and yes they're in love

the job for PSH in the Master is to go full Ham

Yes ofc them being in love is not very easy to miss, I think you can pick that up from the theater next door, even.

Hoffman obviously has big hammy role that calls for big hammy acting moments and he delivers as-promised, but I just think PTA is a little too in awe of him & Phoenix and loses control of the movie to them (imho, anyway). I see it as a transitional film for PTA, exploring and figuring out his mature style, but I much prefer the films that came after it when he has a little more control over the material.

(yes, I thought about caveating the consistency of You Were Never Really Here. Could be his choice or Ramsay cutting out any performance that went OTT, ofc — and Aster & PTA obv genuinely enjoy his performance joyfully leaving rails in the distance. He stays fairly on-message throughout Napoleon, too, at least the theatrical cut.)

Performances aside, I think PTA really excels at building time & place in The Master... this post-war California with a wary sense of optimism, and the blossoming counterculture that would later develop into the freaks of the 'Sixties.' Casting was pretty spot-on as well

(Also I think that boat is moored in Oakland... It was owned by both FDR and briefly Elvis Presley)