Paul Thomas Anderson's Inherent Vice

[Octoberist]

Awesome to see all the good reviews!

 

[Pickleweasel]

getting some bad reviews

 

[MadVillainy]

I still have high hopes for this.

I liked The Master for the performances but this looks like something I'll like for the acting and the story

 

[antonydelfini]

The negative reviews are making me even more excited. The Big Lebowski was not as well-received as it is now, this could be like that. One of the critics who hated this also hated the Master, which I consider a masterpiece.

 

[weezerspider]

I finally got back to my hotel room. Inherent Vice is weird. Really weird. If you’ve read the novel or any Thomas Pynchon novels, I’m sure you know what I mean. Having said that, I wouldn’t have it any other way. If you’ve seen the cast list and trailer, you might think PTA was going to go back to his Boogie Nights/Magnolia ensemble background with Inherent Vice. I expected this, but Inherent Vice feels like a natural transition from There Will Be Blood and The Master. Like those two, and Punch Drunk Love to an extent, Inherent Vice is really only focused on one guy; this time Doc Sportello. Josh Brolin is really the only other actor aside from Phoenix who gets solid screen time. The rest of the big names could almost be considered extended-cameos. Martin Short, Owen Wilson and others play many fantastic characters that Sportello meets along his journey trying to solve his case, but none of them have big roles.

PTA comes back to the ‘70s, but nothing feels like a retread of Boogie Nights. Boogie Nights is about the 70s. Inherent Vice is more about the ‘60s or the death of the ‘60s culture. More importantly, it’s about the death of hope, the peace and love of the 60’s dying out in exchange of a bleak future. The narrative is loose, not as loose as The Master’s IMO, closer to There Will Be Blood, though There Will Be Blood may be stronger in structure than Vice. The plot is very confusing and many people afterwards have complained that the plot is too confusing and all over the place and I see that too, though it seems to work for this film IMO. It seems like the film is supposed to be all over the place. IMO, it’s his funniest film since Boogie Nights, though I find all of his films filled with underline humor. The film has plenty of gags and really is full of humor, but it also so much more to it. Again, only on one viewing, but it seems to be asking a lot of questions, mostly due to the cynical nature of the ‘70s versus the freeness of the 60s. It’s a yearning for the good ol’ days, I guess. It’s a hard film to really dissect intellectually after one viewing.

The Big Lebowksi meets The Long Goodbye description we’ve kept hearing is pretty spot on. PTA’s style in the film is in line with latest works: many long-takes, but slow reserved ones similar to those found in There Will Be Blood and The Master, not energetic ones like those found in Boogie Nights and Magnolia. However, the film has a lot of Medium shots and close ups more similar to The Master than any of his other films.


All in all, I think we have another The Master on our hands, though one filled with more humor. Outside of the gags, the film is hard to grasp and the plot is clearly not interesting to PTA , but the characters are. WB cut a great trailer that will probably get a lot more people to see this than you would expect. It’s crazy weird. Not as weird as The Master, but I left The Master on my first viewing in a similar somewhat confused, but awed state. 9/10

Also, the somewhat mixed response early on is similar to The Master. People will love this and people will hate this.

 

[Tacit Ronin]

I love the mixed response. It makes me even more excited.

 

[antonydelfini]

I love the mixed response. It makes me even more excited.

Yeah, I hope it's as weird and crazy as The Master. It might even be crazier, weirder, and more challenging.

 

[antonydelfini]

I finally got back to my hotel room. Inherent Vice is weird. Really weird. If you’ve read the novel or any Thomas Pynchon novels, I’m sure you know what I mean. Having said that, I wouldn’t have it any other way. If you’ve seen the cast list and trailer, you might think PTA was going to go back to his Boogie Nights/Magnolia ensemble background with Inherent Vice. I expected this, but Inherent Vice feels like a natural transition from There Will Be Blood and The Master. Like those two, and Punch Drunk Love to an extent, Inherent Vice is really only focused on one guy; this time Doc Sportello. Josh Brolin is really the only other actor aside from Phoenix who gets solid screen time. The rest of the big names could almost be considered extended-cameos. Martin Short, Owen Wilson and others play many fantastic characters that Sportello meets along his journey trying to solve his case, but none of them have big roles.

PTA comes back to the ‘70s, but nothing feels like a retread of Boogie Nights. Boogie Nights is about the 70s. Inherent Vice is more about the ‘60s or the death of the ‘60s culture. More importantly, it’s about the death of hope, the peace and love of the 60’s dying out in exchange of a bleak future. The narrative is loose, not as loose as The Master’s IMO, closer to There Will Be Blood, though There Will Be Blood may be stronger in structure than Vice. The plot is very confusing and many people afterwards have complained that the plot is too confusing and all over the place and I see that too, though it seems to work for this film IMO. It seems like the film is supposed to be all over the place. IMO, it’s his funniest film since Boogie Nights, though I find all of his films filled with underline humor. The film has plenty of gags and really is full of humor, but it also so much more to it. Again, only on one viewing, but it seems to be asking a lot of questions, mostly due to the cynical nature of the ‘70s versus the freeness of the 60s. It’s a yearning for the good ol’ days, I guess. It’s a hard film to really dissect intellectually after one viewing.

The Big Lebowksi meets The Long Goodbye description we’ve kept hearing is pretty spot on. PTA’s style in the film is in line with latest works: many long-takes, but slow reserved ones similar to those found in There Will Be Blood and The Master, not energetic ones like those found in Boogie Nights and Magnolia. However, the film has a lot of Medium shots and close ups more similar to The Master than any of his other films.


All in all, I think we have another The Master on our hands, though one filled with more humor. Outside of the gags, the film is hard to grasp and the plot is clearly not interesting to PTA , but the characters are. WB cut a great trailer that will probably get a lot more people to see this than you would expect. It’s crazy weird. Not as weird as The Master, but I left The Master on my first viewing in a similar somewhat confused, but awed state. 9/10

Also, the somewhat mixed response early on is similar to The Master. People will love this and people will hate this.

.

One of the few people here I trust when it comes to movies. This may require multiple viewings.

How would you score and rank all the PTA films?

 

[Tacit Ronin]

How is the narration? Does it work with the tone of he film?

 

[weezerspider]

.

One of the few people here I trust when it comes to movies. This may require multiple viewings.

How would you score and rank all the PTA films?

1. There Will Be Blood
2. Boogie Nights
3. Magnolia
4. Punch Drunk Love
5. The Master
6. Hard Eight

It's too early to really rank Vice IMO, because I honestly was terribly confused at times, but it was a good kind of confusing, similar to how I felt the first time I saw The Master. It took me like six views to really digest The Master (which is one of the many reasons its such a damn fantastic film) and I see Vice as a similar beast. I'd give all of his films except Hard Eight anywhere from 9s to 10s. Hard Eight is a solid 8 IMO. PTA is my favorite director by far, so my ranking changes a lot, aside from the top two which are two of my five favorite films of all time. I have a feeling Vice will be able to compete with Magnolia, PDL and The Master for one of those middle slots. Basically: After seeing Inherent Vice, I can firmly say that Hard Eight remains to be the only PTA film that isn't a masterpiece, IMO.

How is the narration? Does it work with the tone of he film?

I think so. The narration in the trailer is actually a pretty good representation of how it is in the film. A few jokes, kind of laid back. Sets up some scenes. I quite liked it.

Honestly the only thing I was a little bummed about was the cinematography. I thought PTA's experimentation with close ups and medium shots in The Master were due to the size of the 65mm cameras and the difficulty in moving them, but it's more of the same here. It's good, but I miss PTA's long tracking shots.

 

[Tacit Ronin]

It seems PTA is going the way of Malick. Whereas his irst films were artful, yet retained a structure more tolerated by the mainstream, his newer films are becoming more opaque. This will probably lose him his more mainstream fans who will reminisce about the good old days and how he has fallen off.

 

[weezerspider]

It seems PTA is going the way of Malick. Whereas his irst films were artful, yet retained a structure more tolerated by the mainstream, his newer films are becoming more opaque. This will probably lose him his more mainstream fans who will reminisce about the good old days and how he has fallen off.

Yeah, I can see that. PTA has two distinct career eras:

Era 1: Hard Eight, Boogie Nights, Magnolia
Inbetween era: Punch Drunk Love(has bits from both eras)
Era 2: There Will Be Blood, The Master and Inherent Vice.

If you are a fan of Blood and The Master, you'll be a Vice fan. It fits in Era 2 easily.

He's desperate for a mild hit though, which is probably why he let WB edit the Inherent Vice trailer. If his films keep doing The Master numbers, he'll start having a hard time finding bigger funding. He'll have to go low budget which, remarkably, he's never had to do.

 

[antonydelfini]

Yeah, I can see that. PTA has two distinct career eras:

Era 1: Hard Eight, Boogie Nights, Magnolia
Inbetween era: Punch Drunk Love(has bits from both eras)
Era 2: There Will Be Blood, The Master and Inherent Vice.

If you are a fan of Blood and The Master, you'll be a Vice fan. It fits in Era 2 easily.

He's desperate for a mild hit though, which is probably why he let WB edit the Inherent Vice trailer. If his films keep doing The Master numbers, he'll start having a hard time finding bigger funding. He'll have to go low budget which, remarkably, he's never had to do.

I love Era 2 the best. I even love Punch Dunk Love better than Boogie Nights and Magnolia. Each PTA film is better than the one before IMO, I hope Inherent Vice follows that trend.

1. The Master 9.5/10
2. There Will Be Blood 9.5/10
3. Punch Drunk Love 9/10
4. Magnolia 8.5/10
5. Boogie Nights 8.5/10
* Haven't seen Hard Eight

 

[weezerspider]

I love Era 2 the best. I even love Punch Dunk Love better than Boogie Nights and Magnolia. Each PTA film is better than the one before IMO, I hope Inherent Vice follows that trend.

1. The Master 9.5/10
2. There Will Be Blood 9.5/10
3. Punch Drunk Love 9/10
4. Magnolia 8.5/10
5. Boogie Nights 8.5/10
* Haven't seen Hard Eight

Punch Drunk Love, Magnolia and The Master are all pretty even to me. Boogie Nights and There Will Be Blood are both just a hair above those IMO. If The Master is your favorite PTA film, you'll dig Inherent Vice.

 

[antonydelfini]

Yes! Yes! Yes!

 

[weezerspider]

Yeah the more I think about it, the more I realize that the trailer for this film is terribly misleading. This film has way more in common with The Master than Boogie Nights and it is much slower paced and somber than the fast paced gag extravaganza the trailer seems to push. Whatever gets butts in the seats though.

 

[Black Narcissus]

I finally got back to my hotel room. Inherent Vice is weird. Really weird. If you’ve read the novel or any Thomas Pynchon novels, I’m sure you know what I mean. Having said that, I wouldn’t have it any other way. If you’ve seen the cast list and trailer, you might think PTA was going to go back to his Boogie Nights/Magnolia ensemble background with Inherent Vice. I expected this, but Inherent Vice feels like a natural transition from There Will Be Blood and The Master. Like those two, and Punch Drunk Love to an extent, Inherent Vice is really only focused on one guy; this time Doc Sportello. Josh Brolin is really the only other actor aside from Phoenix who gets solid screen time. The rest of the big names could almost be considered extended-cameos. Martin Short, Owen Wilson and others play many fantastic characters that Sportello meets along his journey trying to solve his case, but none of them have big roles.

PTA comes back to the ‘70s, but nothing feels like a retread of Boogie Nights. Boogie Nights is about the 70s. Inherent Vice is more about the ‘60s or the death of the ‘60s culture. More importantly, it’s about the death of hope, the peace and love of the 60’s dying out in exchange of a bleak future. The narrative is loose, not as loose as The Master’s IMO, closer to There Will Be Blood, though There Will Be Blood may be stronger in structure than Vice. The plot is very confusing and many people afterwards have complained that the plot is too confusing and all over the place and I see that too, though it seems to work for this film IMO. It seems like the film is supposed to be all over the place. IMO, it’s his funniest film since Boogie Nights, though I find all of his films filled with underline humor. The film has plenty of gags and really is full of humor, but it also so much more to it. Again, only on one viewing, but it seems to be asking a lot of questions, mostly due to the cynical nature of the ‘70s versus the freeness of the 60s. It’s a yearning for the good ol’ days, I guess. It’s a hard film to really dissect intellectually after one viewing.

The Big Lebowksi meets The Long Goodbye description we’ve kept hearing is pretty spot on. PTA’s style in the film is in line with latest works: many long-takes, but slow reserved ones similar to those found in There Will Be Blood and The Master, not energetic ones like those found in Boogie Nights and Magnolia. However, the film has a lot of Medium shots and close ups more similar to The Master than any of his other films.


All in all, I think we have another The Master on our hands, though one filled with more humor. Outside of the gags, the film is hard to grasp and the plot is clearly not interesting to PTA , but the characters are. WB cut a great trailer that will probably get a lot more people to see this than you would expect. It’s crazy weird. Not as weird as The Master, but I left The Master on my first viewing in a similar somewhat confused, but awed state. 9/10

Also, the somewhat mixed response early on is similar to The Master. People will love this and people will hate this.

Great review! I loved The Master and will most definitely love this.

PTA can't do me any wrong in my eyes. I hear that PTA has the rights to Pynchon's other book (Gravity's Rainbow) I've read that book 3 times and I still have no goddamn idea what he is trying to say. I still loved it.

My PTA ranking:

1.There Will Be Blood
2. Boogie Nights
3. The Master
4. Punch Drunk-Love
5.Magnolia
6. Hard Eight

 

[antonydelfini]

Yeah the more I think about it, the more I realize that the trailer for this film is terribly misleading. This film has way more in common with The Master than Boogie Nights and it is much slower paced and somber than the fast paced gag extravaganza the trailer seems to push. Whatever gets butts in the seats though.

Weezerspider, how's Joaquin's character? Is it as memorable and awesome as Dirk Diggler and Daniel Plainview?

 

[MadVillainy]

Does anyone have a bigger version of this gif?

 

[Doctor Jones]

The mixed responses are kind of a good thing. Since these kind of premieres would be filled with sycophants who bow down to certain filmmakers no matter what. Just not an Emperor's New Clothes scenario (like Fincher's Dragon Tattoo). I don't want a not so great film but people are too big of PTA fans to not admit it not being that great, and trying to find ways to like it. But honestly, this doesn't sound much removed from how I see PTA's films the first time. There Will Be Blood took a while for me to digest, but when I did, damn, I love it. The Master took more than one viewing too. Even if I don't love the movie, I can still find the greatness and method in it.

So less of Boogie Nights and more of There Will Be Blood? I can dig that. There Will Be Blood is my favorite film from him anyway.

He should do a horror film of some kind next. If Kubrick could do it, so could PTA.

 

[weezerspider]

Weezerspider, how's Joaquin's character? Is it as memorable and awesome as Dirk Diggler and Daniel Plainview?

Doc is actually the straight man most of the film. Of course the crazy world that Thomas Pynchon and Paul Thomas Anderson have created is so wacky that our 'straight man' is very cartoonish in his own right, but he has a levity to him that a purely comedic actor could not bring to him. Joaquin brings some honesty to Doc, while also excelling in the humor. Doc certainly lacks efficiency at his job, which causes humor and cartoonish moments, but it never feels over-the-top. It always feels real, as if we were watching someone who simply isn't good at a pretty serious job. It would be funny and it is seeing it on screen. I will say that Doc is one of the easiest characters to root for in PTA's whole filmography. The serious moments in the feel have the weight they need, partially due to Joaquin's ability to blend the styles in his acting so fluidly. The film's so weird I don't see a Best Picture nomination, but Phoenix has a good shot at a Best Actor nomination.

 

[StarLord]

Listen: The Full ‘Inherent Vice’ Soundtrack Featuring Radiohead, Neil Young, Can & More

http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplayl...turing-radiohead-neil-young-can-more-20141006

"Inherent Vice" Soundtrack

1. Dreamin’ On a Cloud – The Tornados
2. Rhythm of the Rain – The Cascades
3. Vitamin C - Can
4. Soup – Can
5. Simba – Les Baxter
6. Spooks - Radiohead
7. Burning Bridges - Jack Scott
8. The Throwaway Age – Bob Irwin
9. Gilligan’s Island Theme – Sherwood Schwartz and George Wyle
10. Harvest – Neil Young
11. Here Comes the Ho-Dads – The Markettts
12. Electricity – Cliff Adams
13. Never My Love – The Association
14. Les Fleur – Minnie Riperton
15. Journey Through the Past – Neil Young
16. Sukiyaki – KYU Sakamoto
17. Adam-12 (Themes and Cues) - Frank Comstock
18. (What A) Wonderful World – Sam Cooke
19. Amethyst - Jonny Greenwood
20. Any Day Now – Chuck Jackson

 

[weezerspider]

A few good links:

http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplayl...-curated-clips-films-you-should-know-20141005

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CqQ_7CpU-_g

 

[weezerspider]

So here's my official write up on Inherent Vice. First thing I want to say is that I think this movie is virtually un-spoilerable.

If someone put a gun to my head and asked me to give a play-by-play of IV’s plot I’d be a dead man. I’ll need to watch it at least seven more times with subtitles before I’ll have the vaguest idea what was going on. Even beyond the plot the movie is difficult to describe. The word “beguiling” has been used and is actually pretty apt. It’s hard to put your finger on, but that’s maybe the point, because Doc has a hard time putting his finger on anything beyond his lost love for the duration of Inherent Vice’s running time. The beauty is that it doesn’t even matter if you’re able to follow the story — what was most compelling to me was the always unexpected, dissonant ways the characters Doc comes across behaved within their vignettes. A scene is moving “this way” and a character is moving “that way” instead. Their life, their full, fleshed out life, memory, experience, all that, is what you’re watching, a specific slice of it shown just because it happens to coincide with the plot’s need to show a character at that moment, but their helping to unravel the mystery doesn’t really seem to matter. We get to see them, instead. This has to have the best acting in any PTA movie, often Cassavetes level, an unprecedented immediacy in comparison to his previous films, and the detective story seems more an excuse for observation, a way to get Doc mobile running around Los Angeles and into the presence of all these insane characters to fix his eyes on what’s-going-on-with-them as humans regardless of their part within the crime thread.

The Master was beautiful but visually this is another horse entirely, a step beyond. It LOOKS like a movie straight up made in the 70s even moreso than Boogie Nights, and if I was unfamiliar with all names involved and happened to see it I’d probably think it actually was. The lighting, the textures, the furniture…how did he do that? It boggles my mind. I wasn’t alive 40 years ago, but even if it isn’t period accurate it definitely doesn’t look “like now”, and it doesn’t look like a pastiche. I need to rewatch the trailer but I feel like it was color timed to appear more like a normal movie, the picture I saw up on that screen felt such a departure from it. Maybe the trailer difference was my imagination. Whatever.

Inherent Vice starts off like something in the tonal vein of Love Streams and morphs, with the momentum of a hawaiian slide guitar, into a mad, mindblowing labyrinth of cryptic doublespeak and double entendres. It’s perverted as hell, thank god (Thank GOD), and DENSE, so many things going on and to pick up on repeat viewings. It’s a slipstream of madcap antics and unbeatable melancholy. Who is who and why is why and how is what I couldn’t tell you. I don’t think I care that I couldn’t tell you. The acting is SO GOOD though, that even when you’re bewildered, when characters like Martin Short’s Doctor Blatnoyd are speaking almost incoherently but Doc seems right there with them and to have some clue what’s going on, you believe them so fully as people, their renderings feel so real, that it doesn’t feel like the scene doesn’t make sense, but that you’re privy to an actual event that took place and just haven’t cracked the code. I loved that. Even if I never make sense of it I could watch it again and again — an endless supply of deranged company to hang out with.

In some ways Inherent Vice feels like a fraternal twin of The Master, conveying similar skepticism about America’s ideals, about its skeptics alternatives, and of any answers in general, and like The Master, at its core the movie is about a love that got away - love the only thing that will save you, and love as a drug that’s worth taking because sobriety in this life without a point doesn’t seem to be worth it. Love as a drug…a loved life worth living…sobriety as a life without love…drugs as a substitute for that lacking love…something or other…

Ironic that this is the film of PTA’s that has a big studio backing behind it — WB is out of their minds. Yeah it has humor, but it’s his least commercial movie by a mile, and I wonder what the **** is going to happen come day one of its wide release when word of mouth spreads. The trailer is SO OFF — I don’t even know what to relate the movie to as I’ve never seen anything else like it. Long Goodbye this Big Lebowski that — the more I think about these comparisons they are not even close. I’ll say this - the movie makes you feel like PTA is the only real filmmaker out there right now making anything new or pushing any boundaries to show you something you haven’t seen before. You realize how rote everything else is in comparison, how many patterns most movies follow even in terms of “art film” style.

 

[Tequilla]

The moment i watched the trailer i know that it just fell off. Probably way different from the movie. Good studio work , because the trailer is really good.

But i dont agree with you weezerspider about breaking pattern. Not because i have seen the film , but there's a lot of stuff out there (europe , asia mostly) that follow absolutely nothing. Breaking barriers film by film. Its not just PTA by any means , altough i agree with you with his complete unitequess and individuality that he brings to his pictures.