The Master

[juggernaut]

Latest Paul Thomas Anderson movie. This is just a clip but jesus I find myself mesmerized by it.  I've watched it a dozen times already.  PTA has a way of creating the most excruciating tension with an undercurrent of malice and violence ready to break through the surface.   The music supports that so well.  Joaquin looks like he's in rare form.  Seems like the total embodiment of the character.  Can't wait to see it.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1560747/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/21/the-master-trailer-paul-thomas-anderson-joaquin-phoenix_n_1533501.html

[johnny problem]

This looks fantastic.

[juggernaut]

New trailer with Phillip Seymour Hoffman.  Supposedly this is kind of a take on how scientology began with Hoffman being Hubbard and Phoenix being his right hand man.

http://www.imdb.com/list/VL4US2x9jkE/#play-all

[GodShifter]

This looks really good.

There Will Be Blood is one of my favorite movies of all-time. Maybe my favorite ever, in fact.

[The Shocker]

This looks really good.

There Will Be Blood is one of my favorite movies of all-time. Maybe my favorite ever, in fact.

Boogie Nights for me.  Same director though.

[deleted account]

how in the holy hell does Magnolia rate higher than Boogie Nights on IMDB?

[The Shocker]

how in the holy hell does Magnolia rate higher than Boogie Nights on IMDB?

The idiot masses are idiots?

[deleted account]

"The masses are asses."- Frederick The Great

true, but this is the first IMDB ratings blunder I've noticed.  Magnolia was ok, but ripped off Short Cuts' premise and really dragged on in spots.  and what the fuck is up with raining frogs?

[The Shocker]

I could see jackasses downgrading Boogie Nights due to its subject matter without even watching it.

[strangelight]

i thought magnolia was pretty damn good. the crime is boogie nights' low ranking, not magnolia's high ranking.

anyway, some trailers:

that auditing session in the second clip is amazing. scientologists be creepy.

[juggernaut]

I don't think that is an auditing scene.  I know Phoenix's character was in the navy and that scene seemed like a military officer was questioning him for the event he brings up at the end.  Could be wrong though.

[juggernaut]

Official trailer

[HORNS]

I saw PT Anderson's new film "The Master" last night. I wrote a review over at that other place.

BOO!  The least you could do is cut and paste it to here.

Last night I was lucky enough to be in attendance of the first screening of Paul thomas Anderson's newest opus, "The Master".

The film features Joaquin Phoenix and Philip Seymor Hoffman in a story about a post WWII cult leader who takes a disheveled and violent drunk under his wing as he builds his cult throughout America.

You've probably heard the buzz about the film. Its a damning indictment of Scientology and weaves a host of its "self help techniques" throughout the story. Most interesting is that a film that scrutinizes and lambasts that very powerful hollywood lobby was funded by someone who has enough money to give them the big 'F- You' without fear of reprisal. Multi Billionaire larry Ellison's daughter, Megan Ellison.


The film is massive in length and scope and not nearly as audience friendly as "There Will Be Blood". Remember the flaming oil tower, the "milkshake" monologue, and the confrontation with the oil executives in the saloon in "There Will Be Blood"? There aren't any scenes like that in this movie. There are some beautifully (exquisitely!) shot scenes and fantastic score that you would expect from PT Anderson, but the story itself plods along without any climaxes and at the same pace for its running time of 2:10. There isn't a likeable character in the film and no conflict or plot point established ever resolves itself. So you are left wondering if there was any discrenable theme at all. But perhaps that was the point.

Joaquin Phoenix puts in the best performance of his career without a doubt. I dont know if he was inhabiting the role - I'm quite sure modern makeup and lighting isn't the sole reason - but he looks haggard as hell. His erratic and combustible character often has you unnerved and at the edge of your seat. But truth be told, there is a wide valley between the talent of daniel Day Lewis and Joaquin Phoenix. I could pay to watch Daniel Day Lewis order a sandwich from a menu he's so charismatic.
Joaquin... not so much. But he definitely is at his best here.

And Philip Seymor Hoffman commands every scene he is in. But the role never seems to be a challenge for him. First and foremost he's there as a major player in the story, but the story never grabs hold of the audience. We move from year to year of this man's life and each failure and discovery(there are no successes) is a step towards more struggles.

As an affront to the belief system of Scientology the films works extremely well. I almost wish I was viewing it as a former Scientologist so I could experience the pleasure of seeing their hackneyed philosophy exposed on the big screen in 70mm. -Oh, I forgot, PT Anderson shot this film in 70mm. the first film to be filmed in 70mm in 26 years or something.

Overall I give it a 6.5 out of 10. But lately I have been changing my mind about films days after seeing them. I'm already feeling better about this film than I did when I walked out of the theater. Its a looong viewing without a lot of high points that register immediately because it never tells you where its going. Now that I've been through it, I'd like to see it again.

_________________

[Dunedin]

Don't be surprised if smartly dressed men get out of a car and shout at you sometime soon.

[juggernaut]

I guess my thread isn't good enough for you

http://stonerrocklives.com/forum/index.php?topic=6029.0

SMOTED.

[HORNS]

I'm going to attribute blame to the forums themselves for allowing me to make a thread with the same title.

"Its not my fault!"

[HORNS]

[GodShifter]

Now everybody can be happy.

[The Shocker]

Hey HORNS, what did you think about Boogie Nights?

[lowdaddy]

i thought magnolia was great.  but boogie nights was better.  and there will be blood is straight-up phenomenal.  the thing about there will be blood is that it's based on the upton sinclair novel oil!.  so i read oil! after seeing there will be blood.  there is no semblance.  i have no idea how you can say the movie is based on the book.  maybe he read the book and then wrote the movie but that's where the similarities end.

[strangelight]

was oil! a good read, though?

[lowdaddy]

it was alright.  you know sinclair was a socialist and the book, in my opinion, was a bit of socialist propaganda.  and i'm just not into dogmatic literature, though i may agree with the writer.

[strangelight]

most rational people are socialists.


/kidding but not really.

[The Shocker]

Aw fuck, just saw a review comparing PTA and the movie to Kubrick and his works.  My boner is about to bust my pants.

[boltthrow]

Saw it yesterday, agree with Horns' review -- though with less actual likeage.

I'm sure there was a point but it wasn't developed in the film for someone as dumb as me (it must be me, right?)

A couple stunning visuals (the ship leaving San Fran, a flashback shot of Joaquin late in the movie wearing his helmet and lighting a cigarette that is sumptuous), a lot of "acting" which seemed to indicate something but I just couldn't put it together.

Actually, there's some stuff in the clips above that isn't in the movie that actually helps me understand it a touch more.   

The one thing is DID achieve was not so much an indictment of Scientology but an understanding of how something as ridiculous as it might appeal to people in serious need of help.  Though it never really seemed to help Joaquin's character as far as I could tell.