Throwing Copper

Yup. Just the way we like it.

Although, I will admit PTA really fucked up The Master. All of that acting talent and what seemed to be an interesting storyline, and he just did not do a good job putting the film together.

inri222

IMO The Master might be his best film, different strokes for different folks.

hanshotfirst1138

I'm curious how The Master will age. I was sort of fascinated and frustrated by the film in equal parts. Long live 70mm though.

hanshotfirst1138

Is it going to get any 35mm screenings ala Interstellar?

inri222

70mm in Los Angeles

https://www.arclightcinemas.com/movi...-inherent-vice

SPiRAL

It was all this except for the last part, unless you count 1 person doing a monologue.

hanshotfirst1138

The MPAA stuff listed "graphic nudity," after the weirdness in The Master, I was expecting similar acres of flesh.

islandclaws

Just got back from the 70mm screening at the Cinerama Dome at Arclight.

I'm someone who mostly loves all of Anderson's films, and I really love "Boogie Nights".

I dug Inherent Vice, but it's easy to see why some may disagree. It's a convoluted film that is as unfocused and hazy as Doc himself. There are just so damn many characters, all with differing motivations and all working with/against someone else. There's A LOT to absorb. A good film can present itself as a puzzle, keeping viewers guessing all throughout. But at some point that puzzle should come together with at least some sense of satisfaction. This film gets so wrapped up in itself that it's hard to call the ending satisfying or even an end. It's just... done.

The look was great, pure '70s aesthetic with thick grain and that Golden Age cinematography. Killer soundtrack and score, too.

I wasn't a big fan of so much being shot in close-up. There are very few two shots or masters or even medium; it's almost entirely close and claustrophobic. Maybe P.T. was trying to draw viewers in closer to Doc's world, maybe it was to increase the vibe of paranoia, but it was too confining for me.

I'd say a good comparison film would be The Long Goodbye. This definitely showed major influence from Altman's film.

Oh, and this is easily the longest film featuring Belladonna I've ever made it through.

Multiple viewings required here, that's for sure.

dex14

dex14

Just bumping this because this should be going wide this weekend. Going to see it tonight at 7:30.

Solid Snake

I like PTA. Really liked The Master, though I'd love to see wtf an extended cut on that one was like if possible.

riotinmyskull

pretty much my exact thoughts. i enjoyed it a lot. just felt a little too fatty.

dex14

Yup. I concur. Was underwhelmed. Phoenix was great in the role though

slop101

Watched it. Liked it. Didn't love it. Least favorite PTA.

I've read the book, and while he was very faithful to it, he strangely didn't take the more cinematic passages from the book to the movie. Being, you know, a movie, I thought that would be a given. But it was very flat, mostly just scene after scene of two people talking. Which is fine, and I did like it, but it kept me at a distance.

And what's with all the close ups? I swear, there were hardly any establishing shots to orient myself to what's going on. Most of the time, each shot was just tight on each face. It got really old, and uncharacteristically uncinematic for PTA. I expected more, especially since he seemed to be growing as a filmmaker with each subsequent film.

islandclaws

That was a problem I had, too. So few master, wide or even medium shots. Very confined and claustrophobic framing, but it did add to Doc's sense of paranoia I suppose.

Troy Stiffler

Packed to the brim with plot and character information. There's so much going on, that anyone who enjoys it is going to need to watch it at least a few times. The average moviegoer probably won't be able to follow the plot, nor take time to analyze what's going on with the characters. A lot of the moments are thrown at you, and acceptable as-is. And then you have to think back and answer the question yourself.

I've heard lots of 60-70's LA-area stories from a guy I know. The setting is perfect and exactly how I had envisioned a lot of his stories. The women were very real. The conservative and anti-hippy police force.

PTA works in a lot of good music. But it's handled differently than before. Don't expect that immediately-visceral result.

[I'm taking this from Ebert.] PTA's movies are also very unpredictable. The plots, the characters and the filmmaking technique. Once we hit the 100 minute mark, the film could wrap up or cut out at any moment. It's a very good feeling to have no idea what's going to happen next.

I might get to the theater to watch it again. It's definitely something I want to watch a couple more times.

slop101

The setting was actually much better handled in the book. Each scene in the movie was zoomed in so tight on a character's face, you couldn't even see the setting most of the time. So much so, it felt like a cost-cutting measure rather than an artistic one, and at $20 million, it's pretty cheap for a movie in today's dollars, especially for a period piece. Hone Alone had a $20mil budget, and that's in 1990 dollars, today it would be about $35mil.

Troy Stiffler

Did anyone notice that there was a maritime lawyer and frozen bananas within a few minutes of each other? Maybe I'm binging on Arrested Development too much.

johnnysd

Definitely an improvement over the Master and it is actually pretty easy to follow for a good portion of the movie, but loses steam and focus in the last hour or so, and the tone was pretty uneven. Worth seeing though, but I won't remember much about it in 10 years and have no burning desire to see it again.

Hazel Motes

If I could have put the pieces together better and wasn't so confused by a lot of it I probably would have rated it even higher, but as it stands I thought it was really good. It had almost a hypnotic quality to it, even though I was baffled by most of it, I was so sucked in and entranced by it that it didn't matter.

Troy Stiffler

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/bPB6GXG7Wa8" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Pretty good interview. I feel less pathetic that I was lost at times. PTA mentions there's a lot of information to follow.

Patman

This film was a chore to sit through. I simply didn't really care for any characters in the film, and the overly long takes and meandering plotlines just didn't really pay off well for me, so it's a miss for me.

I give it 2 stars, or a grade of C.

inri222

Not as good as The Master, but I liked it. Mickey Spillane meets The Big Lebowski. Josh Brolin was a trip in every scene he was in.

4.5/5

Chotto, Kenichiro, Dozo! Motto panukeiku... motto panukeiku! MOTTO PANUKEIKU!

johnnysd

Not trolling, genuinely curious: what did you find so great about The Master?

slop101

I think The Master is PTA's best movie. And the fact that I can't quite articulate why, is just part of the reason.