Life. Death. Amphibians.
The other day we were talking about Magnolia. I love that movie, not in a feeling-movie-critic-cineastey sort of way, but on a visceral level. The first time I saw it I grabbed my head and shrieked to myself, “What is he doing!?! I want more!” It’s the kind of all-out hang-by-your-balls high wire act that film production profit margins don’t allow anymore. There are so many things that could go wrong with it—emotion teetering on the brink of hysteria, multiple plotlines stretching the movie to breaking point, flirting with absurdity (that sing-along might have been hilarious)—but writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson holds it together. By the time that thing happens, we’re ready; he puts us through the wringer, but he pays up. Many critics deemed it a disaster, but that is how I want my disasters to be. I want to get hit in my soul, because I’d feel like I had one.
Even Tom Cruise is fine in Magnolia—maybe not in the scene with the dying father, that was a little cringe-making, but in the interview with the TV reporter, where he looks at her with those dead eyes and says, “I’m silently judging you”. That is the secret to casting Cruise: he’s really effective at playing assholes. Look at him in Collateral and Jerry Maguire. He does well in roles where his little-boy charm can not save him, and he’s forced to dredge up other resources.
It’s been five years since PTA’s last movie Punch-Drunk Love (in which we discover depths to Adam Sandler, not that I mind him shallow). His new film There Will Be Blood, starring Daniel Day-Lewis as a prospector in the oilfields of early 1900s California, opens in December.
Answers to questions you might be asking, unless you wandered onto this site purely by accident >>>
August 29th, 2007 at 23:39
I love PTA! I’m obssessed with his work. He has his way with actors. He knows actors who do their jobs well (IMHO). Philip Seymour Hoffman, John C. Reilly, Mark Wahlberg, Julianne Moore, Gwenyth Paltrow, Adam Sandler, Emily Watson, Melora Walters, etc. I listened to the American Beauty Audio Commentary on DVD (whatever that is officially called) and I think it was Alan Ball (or Sam Mendes himself) who said that PTA was just fun to listen to in his Audio Commentary on the Boogie Nights DVD. He sounded like he’s had a lot to drink. Wish I could have a copy of Boogie Nights on DVD. All I have are downloads, which I’m not proud of, but do I really have a choice? I wish PTA and Fiona Apple never broke up. They would have had genius children who make awesome films and write brilliant songs. I love what PTA did with Apple’s ‘Paper Bag’ video. He really should do a musical next. Maybe the ‘Spring Awakening’ movie, or ‘Buffy the Musical.’ I love Buffy the Musical! I also love the way Kevin Smith hates ‘Magnolia’ yet still maintains civil regards with PTA when they bump into each other. I wish that when they play ‘There Will Be Blood’ here it will run for at least a week. I have work and I can’t guarantee I can watch it on the day it opens.
August 30th, 2007 at 08:29
I’m going to watch Magnolia again. Even if it means having myself bored to death. Even if I end up loosing ample amount of blood due to nose bleeding. I mean, I didn’t really get the movie the first time I watched it…
August 31st, 2007 at 00:37
Hope y’all have also seen Hard Eight. It’s got two of PTA’s regulars: John Reilly and Philip Baker Hall