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

I don't think it's as simple/reductive as "capitalist=evil." I think the movie is saying that capitalists are the ultimate evil, akin to Satan, not always motivated logically. Also, what makes "Blood" different from so many films of even a similar bent is that its villain is its protagonist. He's not just some interloper. It'd be like "Chinatown" from the perspective of John Huston's character. It's all the literally "off-beat" elements such as this that add to the film's unease and make it unique, imo. Not least the ending, which I really appreciate. DDL's power is his own cancerous reward, and he wields it by (symbolically) beating God to death and casting out his son. I think it's much more than "capitalism=bad." It's something more powerful and pervasive than that.

It's not a perfect movie, but TWBB is best viewed as a character study and not some grand statement about history or capitalism or what have you.

The movie is filtered through the mind of a rather rapacious, misanthropic (albeit shrewd) man who doesn't seem to even understand his own motivations, much less those of the people in his life. He's unknowable to both the audience and himself, which gives him the movie a kind of disconnect from itself. It might be off-putting, but I think that distance works to the movie's favor.

http://images.wikia.com/simpsons/images/4/40/20051027141736-kent-my-two-cents-jpg.jpg

My Two Sand Boobs.

original title for my two dads

Phoenix looks like he's aged 40 years and had a stroke in that.

― Josh in Chicago, Monday, 21 May 2012 21:30 (Yesterday) Bookmark

made me think of willem dafoe's frownsmile face, which is kinda strokey now you mention it

He's close enough to 40.

a little rugged wear looks good on his face imho

joaquin, lightly distressed

this is p obvious but there's a big beau travail vibe in that trailer

no, it's more like sonatine.

It'd be like "Chinatown" from the perspective of John Huston's character.

Polanski and Towne's film pays attention to class and ethnicity in ways that TWBB elides. PTA adapted a Sinclair novel for pete's sake!

i just feel like WA has no ability to surprise me anymore. not that novelty is everything, but with PTA im always really curious what he has up his sleeve next. like every single moment of the supposedly magical and enchanting mr. fox was super predictable to me. i dunno, i just think hes a weak writer without owen wilson propping him up

― Hungry4Ass, Tuesday, May 22, 2012 4:02 AM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yes yes and yes. I miss when his movies were actually funny

mega amped for this film

miss when his movies were actually funny

absolutely. i laughed all the way through Rushmore, not much since.

this looks and sounds amazing

well it's been a sad fifteen years, it's true

xp

anyway we can take that to the WA thread, lets talk more about how capitalism is evil

amateurist otm about there will be blood. i can see why people like that movie, but pta is invested in all the opposite things that i am. it really bugged me, the utter lack of historical specificity in that movie.

i only ever saw about twenty minutes of punch drunk love but it seemed like the worst.

definitely this thread is the worst if were ranking

when i left PDL i had to confirm with a friend whether certain things had actually happened or if i'd invented them out of boredom.

I didn't really care about historic specificity or what TWBB said about ~america~, I loved it for spectacle and DDL and brahms

It's not a perfect movie, but TWBB is best viewed as a character study and not some grand statement about history or capitalism or what have you.

This. And also, to the extent that a consistent allegorical thread fails to cohere or that the film seems to fly in the face of historical accuracy, one might consider whether these particular critical approaches are, perhaps, flawed. I think people who criticize PTA's films for being insufficiently deep are always going to be disappointed because I think maybe depth is among the least of his concerns.

i h8 u all perfectly

Can you separate history from a character study? Serious question. I can't. It's my problem with a lot of Amerindie films.

lord knows I've tried alfred. lord knows I've tried.

I left halfway through Rushmore back in 1998, but thought the badger movie was pretty fun.

there it is, the perfect post

I thought the badger movie was pretty fun.

^^ this

WA directed smokin' aces?

Are you guys really complaining about some lack of historical accuracy in "There Will Be Blood?" And that's really what hinders your enjoyment? I'm impressed.

Anyway, I don't see it as a character study, I see it as a mood piece, a la (which is obvious) "2001," albeit more malevolent.

And it definitely addresses class, albeit obliquely and cynically. DDL's power allows him to more or less manipulate an entire town with the promise of money. And the one guy he has no power over, the preacher, is the guy who has his own manipulative power over the penniless rubes, who have nothing else going for them. Not to mention that Planview is considered gauche and low-class by the other oil people, which is why he rubs it in their faces when he wins. In the movie's world, cash rules everything around me, but I don't see it simply as a cautionary anti-capitalist tale. I think Plainview is far more nefarious than that. He is corruption. He is the cancer. He wants to be corrupted and corrosive and he takes joy and pride in bringing everyone down with him. Hence the surreal irony of the film's conclusion: an absolutely lost, damned man (from our perspective) reveling smug and content in his corrosive victory.

no, it's more like sonatine.

this did not occur to me but whoah yes v v otm

as a character study TWBB (i keep wanting to write FWWM, now there's a character study) makes no sense to me. the way the interactions between DDL and other folks is depicted and managed seldom makes any sense or is given any kind of clarifying context (e.g. when the guy discovers DDL has just killed somebody. does he care? if not, why not?). which i guess could be defended but it seems difficult to me to both defend that absence of context/clarity _and_ suggest that the film is meaningfully "about" class, capitalism, america, etc.

the lead character's motivations, such that they can be discerned, seem to shift without warning every scene, and his behavior from scene to scene is entirely inconsistent. not just his behavior, his whole disposition. you cannot reconcile the character of the final scene with that of most of the rest of the movie without doing some painful contortions. and yet (again, for me) PTA doesn't present these contradictions or lacunae in such a way that they make me retroactively rethink the film in ways that increase my engagement or appreciation, much less want to revisit the film.

again, TWBB seems so intently oddball and off-beat, even down to the way he uses classical music in TWBB, where he just keeps playing the same melodically unresolved passage over and over. again, all of these motifs and tactics i can see working well in a different movie that built to something haunting and sturdier, but this film just seems to be nothing but, as i said on another thread, a series of contrarian riffs on some vestigial, more classical narrative. none of this would matter, i suppose, if the film really engaged me on a stylistic level. and there are some bravura scenes in here, but after awhile the long takes etc. seem to kind of peter out in terms of inventiveness and you're left with just empty bombast.

obvs i kind of hate this movie, despite some obvious merits, and a lot of you really like it.

also i agree we shouldn't get into this but WA's andersons movies seem more generous, they project _joy_ to me. and to put it simply i get a lot of joy out of them. i don't know that i'd say they're inexhaustible but they certainly rewarded repeat viewings.

PTA's films, to greater or lesser extents, seem kind of striving, desperate to project their own sigularity--i feel like PTA is sitting in the seat next to me, wild-eyed, slapping me on the back to keep me awake and focused on the wonders of his film. but i find them kind of arid and mostly joyless and they seem to get worse with each screening.

i'm being kind of extreme here, so add your own qualifying adjectives and adverbs.

I find Boogie Nights to be extremely joyful overall (although it obviously contains some sequences that are anything but), and Punch-Drunk Love is largely a journey to that same point.

i should probably not make generalizations about PTA's films since i haven't seen those two in 10 years.

but both of them definitely felt very high-strung and made me anxious.

Oh, see...I've known people who were made anxious by movies and I've had to totally rejigger my recommendations for them. Yes, that being the case, I completely understand why you might hate PTA's work, as he often seems to get a kick out of ratcheting tension.

no it's not the plotting. it's just that everything feels like it is trying to impress me!

i saw Magnolia in the theater and really enjoyed it as a visceral experience, because i was dragged to what i thought would be just a cheesy ensemble drama oscar bait thing, and then there were all those crazy weird surprises that were really exciting to the 17 year old shithead i was. but yeah once you get past that stuff, like amateurist says, i don't think that or TWBB or PDL can do anything but get worse on subsequent viewings. likewise i remember Hard Eight fondly but i only saw it once around the same age and probably thought the dude's pocket catching on fire was funny and cool.

it's just that everything feels like it is trying to impress me!

I get that from both these directors, but I prefer PTA's attempts to impress me. WA seems even more "I'm about to have the big scene where you feel something so be ready for that" - what you see as incoherence/inconsistency in PTA I see as a read on naturalism - his characters' motivations are inconsistent, as are: mine, those of most people I know, etc. Clean narrative is kind of a romantic need; most people, like Plainview, are motivated by whatever their needs are at the moment, imo.

I find Boogie Nights to be extremely joyful overall

Have said as much many times; the scene at the end where Reynolds glides around his house checking in on everyone is as joyous as anything I can think of.

So, Tom Cruise has seen this and he "has issues". They are trying to screen it for Travolta next. There's no better publicity than an incensed Scientologist, I suppose

Oh, come on, they are not really screening this for notable celebrity Scientologists, are they? That does not seem to be PTA's thing.

PTA and Cruise are friends, so it makes sense that he'd want to show it to the guy.

http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/tom-cruise-has-seen-paul-thomas-andersons-the-master-has-issues-with-it-20120522

Even so, what the fuck? So PTA would puss out his movie to please Tom Cruise? Why even make it, then?

I assume it was just a courtesy. I doubt he'd make any changes just cause Cruise didn't like it

i don't think this is going to be the blistering excoriation of hubbard / scientology that many folks are hoping for. it's likely to be a complicated character study of l. ron hubbard, and if scientologists have 'issues' with showing the flawed humanity of their dear leader, it's because they've been indoctrinated to believe the man infallible in his teachings.

the link saying the screenings are more about deciding whether to explicity mention/acknowledge Scientology in the marketing film, which makes sense. he probably also just wants Cruise to have a heads up, so he doesn't feel anxious or ambushed when the movie hits theaters.

iirc, one of the introductory passages of _dianetics_ says that if you don't understand any passages of the book, then it is YOUR FAULT as a reader, and that you must reread the passages until they make sense. any misunderstanding is in NO WAY because hubbard presents a confusing belief system via turgid, confusing jargon.

i can only imagine what sort of cyclopean, messianic asshole this thinking made hubbard irl, and i can see why followers might be uncomfortable with that.

we know, dude. scientology sucks. thread kinda doesn't need to be about that.