Paul Thomas Anderson Returns!

by · May 22, 2012

No other filmmaker can hold a sacred candle to writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson when he directs his mind, heart, and camera to American religiosity.  Those who’ve seen Magnolia and There Will Be Blood can testify to this.

Muses be praised, Anderson has a new film on the horizon called The Master, staring the Philip Seymour Hoffman, Joaquin Phoenix, Amy Adams, and Laura Dern.

I hear it’s very loosely based on the founding and rise of Scientology, but this association has been downplayed.  In any case, it’s about the people involved in the founding of a new religion–“The Cause”–following World War II.

You can view the cryptic teaser here.

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Kyle Cupp

Kyle Cupp is a freelance writer who blogs about culture, philosophy, politics, postmodernism, and religion. He is a contributor to the group Catholic blog Vox Nova. Kyle lives with his wife, son, and daughter in North Texas. Follow him on Facebook and Twitter.

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6 Responses

  1. Russell Saunders says:
    May 22, 2012 at 5:20 pm

    I’ve never seen “Magnolia.” I have negative, breakup-related associations with the soundtrack, but I think enough time has passed that I’ll probably be able to hear the songs in question without experiencing the visceral reaction I used to have. I’ll have to check it out.

    And I’m one of a small handful of people I know who loved “Punch Drunk Love.”

    • Kyle Cupp says:
      May 22, 2012 at 5:38 pm

      I’m among them. Sandler and Watson were an inspired pair.

      “I have a love in my life. It makes me stronger than anything you can imagine.”

      • Russell Saunders says:
        May 22, 2012 at 7:40 pm

        As a friend once noted, with which I agree, Sandler’s performance in “Punch Drunk Love” makes much of his other dreck all the more unforgivable. He can do beautiful work! Why with the mugging and the dumb voices and idiot man-child routine?

        • Will Truman says:
          May 23, 2012 at 7:42 am

          I haven’t seen Punch Drunk Love, but loved Funny People. In it, they make fun of the sort of dreck that Sandler has starred in over the years. I kind of thought after that, he might… you know… stop starring in the dreck he mercilessly made fun of (or starred in a movie that did). Nope.

  2. Mark Armour says:
    May 22, 2012 at 7:01 pm

    I rarely miss anything by P.T. Anderson, Wes Anderson or the Coens but I confess to not having seen Hard Eight yet. Russell: you must watch Magnolia. Count me among those who also loved everything about Punch Drunk Love.

    • Russell Saunders says:
      May 22, 2012 at 7:43 pm

      “Hard Eight” is very much:

      1) An early work by a talented filmmaker not yet entirely sure of himself, and

      2) Emblematic of the gritty, independent films in vogue at the time.

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