Now Playing — One Battle After Another
Improbably and impressively, a masterful director outdoes himself Continue reading Now Playing — One Battle After Another
Tag: paul thomas anderson
The Art of the Sell — Magnolia teaser trailer
These posts celebrate the movie trailers, movie posters, commercials, print ads, and other promotional material that stand as their own works of art. Sometimes I think every movie trailer should introduce close-ups of all the actors introducing themselves in character. … Continue reading The Art of the Sell — Magnolia teaser trailer
Then Playing — The King of Staten Island; The Way We Were; Licorice Pizza
The King of Staten Island (Judd Apatow, 2020). This film represents a new nadir for director Judd Apatow’s exhausting tendency to develop a container ship’s worth of individual scenes with only the vaguest concern of how they might fit together … Continue reading Then Playing — The King of Staten Island; The Way We Were; Licorice Pizza
Now Playing — Phantom Thread
It’s probably not one-hundred percent correct to say that Phantom Thread is unmistakably a Paul Thomas Anderson film, but it sure feels right. The new cinematic offering is meticulously crafted, resolutely erudite, psychologically complicated, packed with insightful acting, and careens … Continue reading Now Playing — Phantom Thread
From the Archive: There Will Be Blood
We’re in that part of the film year when patience is necessary. While a few big cities have every Oscar hopeful cramming onto their screens, those of us residing in less populous burgs have to wait and wait. On a recent trip to New York, I have the opportunity to get ahead of the roll-out release schedule somewhat, but there are a whole slew of titles that have me drumming my fingers while giving sidelong glances at the calendar. Among them is The Phantom Thread, the reunion of director Paul Thomas Anderson and actor Daniel Day-Lewis, the latter purportedly in … Continue reading From the Archive: There Will Be Blood
You think you’re alone until you realize you’re in it, now fear is here to stay, love is here for a visit
I’ve had a couple different conversations by now which involved listing all the other filmmakers that come to mind when watching Paul Thomas Anderson’s Inherent Vice. The director has already acknowledged a surprising influence from the early nineteen-eighties oeuvre of Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker, especially Top Secret!, and the film does often play like one of their outlandish comedies dragged through a heavy Anderson filter in much the same way that Punch Drunk Love is a standard Adam Sandler comedy given the same transformative treatment. There’s also the clearest echo of Robert Altman since Anderson’s Magnolia, if only in a clear resemblance to … Continue reading You think you’re alone until you realize you’re in it, now fear is here to stay, love is here for a visit
I want your picture but not your words, you know they want it, but there’s no verse
Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Master has the look, feel and tone of a masterpiece. It has a distinct anti-narrative structure that allows even the moments that falter to feel organically right, refutations of the supposed need for everything in a … Continue reading I want your picture but not your words, you know they want it, but there’s no verse
Top Fifty Films of the 00s — Number Twenty-Two
#22 — Boogie Nights (Paul Thomas Anderson, 1997) Paul Thomas Anderson builds Boogie Nights with the exuberant fervor of someone who may never again be given access to a movie camera. From the extended tracking shot that opens the film–a … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 00s — Number Twenty-Two
Top Fifty Films of the 90s — Number Thirty-Six
#36 — Magnolia (Paul Thomas Anderson, 1999) The trailer for Magnolia billed it as “A P.T. Anderson Picture.” It was the writer-director’s third feature, and the follow-up to 1997’s Boogie Nights, the film that first garnered him significant attention and … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 90s — Number Thirty-Six
Top Fifty Films of the 00s — Number Twenty-Two
#22 — There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007) Paul Thomas Anderson insists that when he wrote the screenplay for There Will Be Blood, he had only one actor in mind for the lead role of Daniel Plainview. What’s … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 00s — Number Twenty-Two
Coffee for Two 