Phantom Thread

A renowned, particular, and impatient London dress designer (Daniel Day-Lewis) in the 1950s grows annoyed with and dismisses his current lover before a strong willed, foreign born waitress (Vicky Krieps) catches his eye and takes her place, becoming muse and model while forging a toxic, codependent relationship and butting heads with his watchful, protective sister (Leslie Manville). P.T. Anderson's Phantom Thread, a beautifully shot, fascinating look into a sequestered world and life, is slow to start before becoming severely strange and ultimately deeply involving. It features another, (said to be his final) consummate performance from DDL and another acute, obsessive and slightly inhuman characterization. Krieps is magnetic, holding her own with her intimidating partner and Manville exhibits great control and subtle humor in an Oscar nominated performance.

*** 1/2 out of ****

Magnolia

The lives of ten quasi related Los Angeleans, most with some connection to a long running children's quiz show, are put through the emotional ringer on a long, rainy day as they face personal and past revelations that reach a literal biblical proportion. Paul Thomas Anderson's brilliantly directed, captivating, and draining pastiche is remarkably only barely marred by its extreme length and aptitude for pretentiousness and self-indulgence. While some of the actors are hard to stomach (Juliane Moore, Melora Walters), most are tremendous including Philip Baker Hall, Melinda Dillon, William H. Macy, John C. Reilly, Jason Robards, Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Tom Cruise in a fierce, highly charged, career-topping turn as a misogynistic self-help sex guru.

**** out of ****

Inherent Vice

On the beaches of Los Angelas in the 1970s, part-time detective and full-time doper Doc Sportello (Joaquin Phoenix) receives a call from his ex (Katherine Waterston) who asks him to look into the dealings of her current tycoon boyfriend. When she goes missing shortly thereafter, Doc is hurled into a psychedelic labyrinthine underworld  featuring a kaleidoscope of layabouts, druggies, overzealous cops, menacing power players, and other L.A. types. With Inherent Vice, Paul Thomas Anderson takes a step back from the epic-scaled ambiguities of There Will Be Blood  and The Master with his no less lengthy and ambitious adaptation of Thomas Pynthon's recent novel, his first to reach the big screen, which again affirms Anderson's meticulous talents plus an affinity for comedy (and perhaps demonstrates why Pynchon's scattershot work has taken so long to be adapted theatrically). Vice is irreverent, bizarre, and often hilarious with a convoluted, drugged-out plot that plays like a mash-up of The Big Lebowski and The Long Goodbye. Phoenix demonstrates his versatility once again in a finely tuned, humorous turn and receives like support from Josh Brolin and Owen Wilson.
*** 1/2 out of ****

The Master

In the waning days of WWII, a bored and somewhat brutish midshipman (Joaquin Phoenix) goofs off with his comrades, and returns home to a listless existence, going from job to job and woman to woman. Then one night, following his most recent drunken debacle,  he stows away on a luxury liner commanded by the leader of a group known as The Cause, and finds himself being drawn in by the hypnotic mystic (Philip Seymour Hoffman) and his off-brand, mind altering sect. "The Master" is a technically exceptional film from art house champion Paul Thomas Anderson, probably the finest he has ever filmed, which features a fierce performance from Hoffman, and a career defining one from Phoenix. Amy Adams work as Hoffman's resolute wife also bears mentioning, as her fine performance has bafflingly become lost in the headline grabbing performances of her costars. Despite these accolades, Anderson's narrative is slight and unnecessarily protracted, dragging on much longer than it needs to. There is also a tendency by many critics to search for greater significance in this Scientology inspired fable, when all of its substance is clearly evident on screen, with Anderson never cutting further than skin deep. During a sequence in the film when Hoffman reacquaints Phoenix into his group he states, "this is going to be a long and difficult process." That should have been the tagline for this movie.