Tag: Joaquin Phoenix

Inherent Vice

“Inherent Vice” is a movie you simply inhale, so rich with characters and humor as to live inside it.

Inherent Vice PosterPaul Thomas Anderson’s adaptation of “Inherent Vice,” Thomas Pynchon’s classic pulp crime novel, isn’t so much about drugs as it is the idea of drugs. It’s quite easy to say the whole thing is a trip, but then there’s an unspoken nuance to all the little details that make it feel like a hallucination. The plot is so dense you couldn’t map it with a flow chart, but the subtle humor behind PTA’s rich and ever growing cast of characters puts a satirical edge on the whole cloak and dagger ordeal. You don’t unravel “Inherent Vice’s” plot; rather, to perpetuate the drug analogy, you just inhale.

Joaquin Phoenix plays Doc Sportello, a ‘70s private investigator with a mutton chop beard sitting in a hazy blue bungalow, marijuana smoke drifting in from the frames. Like a sudden beacon of light in his calm world of Gordita Beach, Cali comes Shasta (Katherine Waterston), donning an orange, curvy sundress and “looking like she always said she wouldn’t”. Shasta’s an old ex of Doc’s, so she asks for his help. Her latest boyfriend is the wealthy real estate mogul Mickey Wolfman (Eric Roberts), and his wife and her fling want to commit Wolfman to a mental institution and steal his fortune.

Meanwhile, Doc gets a visit from the Black Panther Tariq Khalil (Michael Kenneth Williams) asking him to locate one of Wolfman’s associates, an Aryan Brotherhood biker named Glen Charlock. When Glen turns up dead, with Doc’s passed out body lying right beside him, Doc is hauled in by Lt. Detective “Bigfoot” Bjornsen (Josh Brolin). Bigfoot has a flat top hair cut and the hardened features of a man’s man who could find his place in just about any decade. He suspects Doc could help lead him to Wolfman and Shasta, who have now disappeared, and that Doc, stoned as he perpetually is, may know more than he actually knows.

That’s only the crust of all “Inherent Vice” has to offer, but this story and these characters alone feel so well drawn that you’ll follow it down just about any rabbit hole. The dialogue and narration by Joanna Newsom is all Pynchon, and in mere sentences he conveys personalities that seem fuller than anything in literature. Like “The Godfather”, these characters even have names that sink in even if you can’t place who they are. When they speak, they’re all business, but on closer scrutiny it’s pure screwball. At one point, Doc is attempting to track down The Golden Fang, which may be a boat, a gang, a company, or all three. How that makes any sense is anyone’s guess.

Very much like Robert Altman’s “The Long Goodbye”, whom Anderson owes a big debt in several of his films and especially this one, “Inherent Vice” is essentially a big pot for this rich cast of characters to stew. The film never stays put, but as Anderson follows Doc from place to place, there’s a sense of humor, sex appeal and sinister undertones that he carries along. We see it as Wolfman’s “sexy chicana” house keeper bends languidly in front of Doc as she serves his drink, or as Mrs. Wolfman’s hulking mass of a squeeze is introduced to us from the neck down.

But where Altman was potentially uninterested in the plot details of Raymond Chandler, Anderson is in deep with Pynchon’s mystery. At any point the film seems to be deceiving you, whether it’s a TV commercial beginning to talk directly to Doc, a group of troopers suddenly sneaking up on a remote building and disappearing behind brush, or perhaps most hilariously of all, a sudden outburst of “pussy eating”.

Did we really just see all that? Is any of this really happening? That Anderson plays with that perception constantly and still finds a way to cobble together all the pieces in ambiguous, uncertain ways, is part of “Inherent Vice’s” appeal to watch it not just once, but again and again, forever getting lost in its hazy, drug addled fever dream.

3 ½ stars

The Immigrant

James Gray’s lush period drama is a movie about loss and wondering what your life has become rather than a historical document.

How did I get here? What happened to me that this is what my life has become? How do I find my way and some hope leading toward a bright future?

For many Europeans at the turn of the 20th Century, the answers to those questions lied across the Atlantic Ocean on the shores of America. And American films, even those period pieces that have explored the hardship of immigration, are seduced by the allure of The American Dream.

Director James Gray uses this backdrop to explore those questions on universal terms. In “The Immigrant,” coming to America means being stuck in a state of purgatory, being without hope or happiness and always fighting for survival. It’s a film about being lost, and not only in America.

The film starts as Ewa (Marion Cotillard) and her sister Magda are arriving at Ellis Island from Poland. Magda is immediately swept out of line to the infirmary for treating tuberculosis, and Ewa is about to be deported after being accused of being a “woman of low morals” while on board the ship.

We see none of her time back home or on the ship, and what exactly a “woman of low morals” means is not readily explained. But here Ewa is, stuck in Ellis Island about to be deported without her sister and wondering how she wound up in this mess in the first place. Immigrant or not, this feeling is not unique to Ewa. Continue reading “The Immigrant”

Her

Spike Jonze’s “Her” deepens our relationship with humans by embracing love and technology.

We live in a world of screens. There are now more screens and devices on this planet than there are humans. So it’s amazing how few of them there are in Spike Jonze’s “Her.”

Jonze’s film only invokes technology as a way to communicate the imperfect beauty of human nature. “Her” has a sci-fi high concept but it’s as true and honest a relationship movie as any ever made.

In Jonze’s near future, men don un-ironic mustaches, pants are beige and hitched high with no buttons or belt loops for style, walls and homes are pristine white and softly focused but not exaggeratedly so, and few people crane their necks staring down at cell phones. Everyone can be seen talking with head held high, but they’re speaking to indiscreet ear buds implanted in their sides, getting headlines and emails read aloud to them on the subway. In this new age Los Angeles, everyone is alone together. Continue reading “Her”

Off the Red Carpet: Week 3 (10/17 – 10/24)

Three weeks have passed since I started this column, we’re 18 weeks away, and I’ve seen yet another two major contenders thanks to the Chicago International Film Festival (I might’ve seen three if not for CIFF’s awful secret screening selection), “The Sessions” and “Silver Linings Playbook.”

“Silver Linings” is exactly the kind of film that could take Best Picture and sweep some of the acting awards if I didn’t think “The Master” could absolutely dominate in the acting branch, and that’s because it’s a crowd pleasing romantic comedy with a lot of depth and poignancy about disabilities. It’s more about disabilities than even “The Sessions,” which just uses its problem as a plot device. If it did, it would probably be the first straight rom-com to win since “Annie Hall.”

But this was a busy week elsewhere, so let’s get down to it.

Joaquin Phoenix calls Oscar season “bullshit,” heads explode amongst people who care about this stuff

Sometimes I’m really disappointed by the media. They have a habit of making a story out of nothing because when one person reports it, everyone else has to spread it around. Joaquin Phoenix said in a terrific interview with Elvis Mitchell for Interview magazine that he thought the whole act of campaigning and comparing people’s performances is “total, utter bullshit.” “It’s a carrot, but it’s the worst tasting carrot I’ve ever tasted in my whole life. I don’t want this carrot.”

That quote alone should give a sense of how batshit crazy and awesome the rest of the interview actually is, but pundits decided to pick out this quote and make a big deal about it, some claiming that he now doesn’t stand a chance at even a nomination.

Well, he’s too good in “The Master” for that. This wouldn’t be the first time someone has put down the Oscars and completely opted out of coming to the ceremony and still won (see: Woody Allen, for one). It’s clear that after two losses (“Gladiator,” “Walk the Line”) he’s tired of the posturing and is seeking a different kind of truth in his performances. So everyone can just calm down. (via Entertainment Weekly and Interview Magazine)

Gotham Award Nominations Announced

The Gotham Awards are significant because they’re the first batch of nominations in this long, long, long awards season. They recognize indie films that would otherwise need a boost amongst the studio fare, and this year they’ve helped put “Moonrise Kingdom” and “Beasts of the Southern Wild” back into the conversation. “Beasts” didn’t score a Best Feature nod, opting instead for the lesser known “The Loneliest Planet” and “Middle of Nowhere,” but director Benh Zeitlin scored a nomination and could make some surprise waves come Oscar time. Also in the fray is Richard Linklater’s “Bernie.” There is a small but vigorous campaign to get Jack Black nominated for an Oscar, and this is his first step in that direction. (via In Contention)

George Clooney could be first to be nominated in six Oscar categories

Guy Lodge of In Contention observed in a case of severe data overload that if “Argo” is nominated for Best Picture, producer George Clooney would be the first person to ever be nominated in six separate categories, Best Picture (“Argo”), Best Adapted Screenplay (“The Ides of March”), Best Director and Original Screenplay (“Good Night, and Good Luck”), Best Actor (“Michael Clayton, “Up in the Air,” “The Descendants”) and the category he won for, Best Supporting Actor (“Syriana”). Does Clooney sing? Maybe we can get him nominated for Best Original Song next year. (via In Contention)

“Holy Motors” and “After Lucia” take top prizes at CIFF

CIFF doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of the awards season, but I was there to enjoy it, and for “Holy Motors” to win its first major prize, along with an acting prize for Denis Lavant, says something. I’ve even heard people making a case for Best Original Song for Kylie Minogue’s cameo. I’ll remind you that I hated the film and appear to be the only person on the planet who thinks this way, but there’s no denying it’s not exactly up the Academy’s alley. “After Lucia” however is Mexico’s entry in the Foreign Film race, so any recognition is always a good thing. (via Hollywood Chicago)

Best Costume Design for “Django Unchained”?

Some pundits seem almost adamant in declaring that Quentin Tarantino’s latest film doesn’t really stand much of a chance this Oscar season, but I came across this interesting blog that says otherwise in one peculiar category: Best Costume Design. “Django’s” period clothing is done by Sharen Davis, nominated twice previously for “Ray” and “Dreamgirls.” The article also points out that Tarantino is responsible for some of the most iconic costumes in recent memory but has nothing to show for it. (via Clothes on Film) Continue reading “Off the Red Carpet: Week 3 (10/17 – 10/24)”

The Master

Don’t blink. If you do, we have to start from the beginning.

This phrase marks the first time both Philip Seymour Hoffman and Joaquin Phoenix truly communicate with one another in “The Master” and possibly the last time they really get inside each other’s heads.

They’re in each other’s control, both devoting their full attention. We, as an audience, can look away no sooner.

With “The Master,” Paul Thomas Anderson has made yet another film that demands intense focus and patience. But it rewards those opening their eyes with a vividly allegorical film about the lengths of human control, one with tour de force performances, hauntingly pallid colors and towering images of stunning depth and clarity.

We meet Freddie Quell (Phoenix) languishing over his peers at the end of World War II. Sprawled out on his ship’s upper deck, he looks like the giant in “Gulliver’s Travels” surrounded by swarms of shipmates way below hurling stones to wake him. He’s arrived at this point after a night of heavy drinking, enabled by a lethal cocktail of his own fermenting. This swill will get him into trouble later when it poisons an elderly farmer.

The incident sends Freddie running and hiding as a stowaway to the cruise ship of Lancaster Dodd (Hoffman), a man who comes to be known to Freddie only as Master. He’s a writer, philosopher, doctor, but above all a man, as he says to Freddie, but more accurately he’s the leader of a growing cult movement called The Cause.

Maybe it’s because he enjoys Freddie’s swill, but Master sees potential, bravery and room for personal growth in Freddie. He takes him into his home, enlists him as a guinea pig for The Cause, performs “processing” on him and believes that through Master’s own guidance, Freddie can be helped.

Master and The Cause are both fictional versions of L. Ron Hubbard and Scientology, and the accounts of the film show the religion’s initial development in the early ‘50s. And yet neither this comparison nor the actual plot of the film give a great sense of what “The Master” is really about.

More so than a nihilistic condemnation of Scientology, Anderson uses this as a setting and metaphor for themes of sexual repression and the possibility of man. Continue reading “The Master”