Team Experience: The Master

I'm out and about again (finally!) so my greedy eyeballs will be on The Master soon. I challenged Team Experience to describe the film in three words since so many critics can't even settle on what it's even about (I'm avoiding reviews but the non-consensus as to meaning is out there).

Four brave souls took me up on the challenge...

Matt Zurcher writes:

Fevered heart need.
The intensity of The Master is impossible to understate. The style itself is unhinged -- crazy, even. The characters are bloated visions of Freudian extremes. The Master is filmmaking of the highest order, yes. But it's also cinema that works on its own terms, so full of cocky flair and delightful self-indulgence that the audience has no choice but to follow it wherever it wants to go. Anderson's fable can seem alienating or disorganized on first viewing, but a second reveals the director's compassion. Joaquin Phoenix's face is a shattered one, but his tears are so heartbreakingly believable. The passion and need that these two men feel for each other begs to be known. And in all the intellectualization of this film that we're going to see, let us remember that it's really just about two people who need each other and who love each other. It's the best love story I've seen since Punch-Drunk Love.

You can read Matt's full review here.

Beau McCoy writes:

Opaque Rabid Jazz

"The Master" makes "Cosmopolis" look as accessible as a Spielberg film. Purposely distant and muddled; what are we watching and why? Ferocity abounds in its many forms and incarnations. Moves like a jazz solo; we don't know where we're going. Why should it matter? Premature.

Alexa says:

Disappointing Beautiful Molasses
There's a truly great film here waiting to be pulled out of the molasses...

You can read more of her thoughts, here.

Finally, Jose was even more succinct but I suspect it's something of a spoiler so I'm putting it after the jump...

Click to read more ...

Anne vs. Amy. Oscar Chart Updates!

If anyone can threaten the widely held assumption that Anne Hathaway will win the Supporting Actress Oscar come February for dreaming that dream in time gone by in Les Misérables, isn't it Amy Adams in Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master? In the heat of August, Anne seems to have this thing sewn up. But August is August. It ain't February.  

Actress Wars 2012: Anne vs. Amy

Though we haven't seen either performance yet, it's worth noting that Oscar wars are rarely won by a stand alone acting achievement. They can be, sure, but more often than not they're fought with a fluctuating combo of deft campaign tricks, strong timing, media drum beatings, general feelings for the film that houses said performance, barely acknowledged collective memories of past triumphs and defeats, preconceived notions of what the actors in questions are capable of, and other films  -- particularly brand new ones or "snubbed" but beloved efforts -- that contribute to or detract from the "It's Her/His Time" argument.

So, let's discuss ANNE & AMY (&, yes, STREEP) with a fancy battle chart...

Click to read more ...

Yes, No, Maybe So: "The Trouble With the Curve"

Longtime Clint Eastwood collaborator Robert Lorenz (producer or first assistant director on many Clint features) rousted Clint out of the director's chair and in front of the cameras for a father/daughter baseball scouting drama The Trouble With the Curve. Or is it a comedy? Let's break down the trailer with our usual system.

YES

• Always up for a father/daughter drama... and Eastwood gave that relationship all sorts of interesting edges and nuances and softspots in Million Dollar Baby. Plus in the interest of selling Gran Torino 2 with all those shots of Clint "Get Off My Lawn!" Eastwood maybe we're not seeing some of the meat of the central relationship in the trailer.
• Amy! Just saw her in Into the Woods in Central Park. She got majorly swallowed up in her wig (so big that from my bad seat I could barely notice her face) but I like that even if she might not have limitless range she is able to adapt her screen persona for drama, comedy, and musicals. That's a type of range -- the movie star type of range which is nothing to scoff at.
• Hei John Goodman!

NO and maybe so after the jump...

Click to read more ...

Yes, No, Maybe So: "The Master"

Hot on the heels of this beautiful new teaser poster for The Master, movie poster as chilled wine, we get the full trailer! P.T. Anderson's long awaited big screen return teaser post recalls the also evocative and text-focused teaser poster for There Will Be Blood which will be a very tough act to follow.

Even the Academy, which had resisted his sometimes challenging, defiantly eccentric and untraditional melding of epic treatment to non-traditionally-epic subject matter got into There Will Be Blood. But if anyone can live up to that film, wouldn't it be P.T.? He's never made anything less than a good movie and quite often he manages instant classics: Hard Eight, Boogie Nights, Magnolia, Punch Drunk Love, and There Will Be Blood. (Good luck finding anyone else with a filmography that consistently fine!)

Trailer and Yes No Maybe So breakdown follow...

Click to read more ...

Link to the Rescue

First Showing Django Unchained banner on the Croisette in Cannes
Inlander Don Draper isn't Mad Men's main character any more
Filmofilia a full slate for Amy Adams through 2014 at least. Add thriller Dark Places (based on the novel of the same name) to the long list
Cinema Blend Rise of the Planet of the Apes sequel gets the Contagion screenwriter Scott Z Burns 

 MZ Yikes. Actor Nick Stahl of Bully, Terminator 3 and Carnivàle fame has been reporting missing since May 9th
Heat Vision Robert Downey Jr's The Avengers payday could reach $50 million. The other actors aren't so lucky
Gold Derby Downton Abbey will be competing in Best Series (where it belongs) for Emmy nods... finally giving up on considering itself a miniseries, bless.
Pajiba "Identifying the Moment in Natalie Portman's Career Timeline In Which It Was OK To Admit a Crush"
Screen Daily Keira Knightley replacing ScarJo in Can a Song Save Your Life 

Indiewire Awesome news for fans of the gay romantic drama Weekend (2011). Criterion will handle the DVD.
Michael Musto interviews Andy Dick, now sober but just as candid.
Coming Soon Orphan star and now Hunger Games victim Isabelle Fuhrman will star in the remake of Suspiria
The Film Stage Terrence Malick's latest, a romantic drama starring Ben Affleck, Olga Kurylenko, and Rachel McAdams (at least according to which characters feature in the synopsis) finally gets a title... To the Wonder.  

Not Your Usual Superhero Articles
Filmwell "thou shalt have no other god but Captain America's" on references to the divine in The Avengers
GeekWatch adorable story of a five year old boy meeting Captain America and Loki on the set of The Avengers