Kino Meditations

One of the most widely acclaimed directors of the modern era, Paul Thomas Anderson saw his latest film, One Battle After Another, hit theaters this past weekend, to rave reviews. He seems primed for a long-overdue Oscar narrative this upcoming awards season. As critics already hail it as one of his best and most urgent, I decided to take a look back at the rest of his filmography leading up to this moment, and rank all of his films, something which proved no easy task. Nevertheless, I did my best. While I have seen One Battle After Another, I opted not to include it here, as I need to see it a few more times, and perhaps let some time pass, before I decide where to place it.

9. Hard Eight (1996)

Hard Eight (1996) is PTA’s first feature film, based in part on his short film, Cigarettes and Coffee, which caused quite a sensation 3 years earlier at Sundance Film Festival. Hard Eight stars Philip Baker Hall as Sydney, a senior and veteran gambler who takes a homeless man, played by John C. Reilly, under his wing. Gwyneth Paltrow and Samuel L. Jackson also star. A really interesting character study disguised as a gambling/crime film, it is a solid first outing for Anderson, featuring one of the best performances of Philip Baker Hall’s career, an actor who would go on to star in the next two films from the director.

While the film proved to be the boost Paul Thomas Anderson needed to get his start in the industry and start working on Boogie Nights, which features a character he had created earlier in life for The Dirk Diggler Story (1988) – a short mockumentary film he developed at prep school when he was 18 years old – he would go on to loftier heights with his other films, both critically and commercially.

8. Licorice Pizza (2021)

Licorice Pizza (2021) was Paul Thomas Anderson’s last film before this year’s One Battle After Another. A return to the San Fernando Valley as a setting, as well as to the 1970’s as a period the story is set in, the film sees Philip Seymour Hoffman’s son Cooper Hoffman make his feature film debut as Gary Valentine, a 15-year-old actor who meets a 25-year-old photographer’s assistant who dreams of doing more with her life, played by Alana Haim. A number of high-profile actors and directors star in supporting roles, such as Bradley Cooper and Sean Penn.

PTA shows his true mastery in this film, which comes at the end of a 25-year run that started with Hard Eight. While the film is very good, and one of the funniest Anderson has done, I could never really get past the age gap of the central romance’s characters. While it could be argued that it is accurate for the time period, as relationships such as this might have been common (I guess even more so if the genders were swapped), I still find it a weird choice. To add to this, I find everything happening around the main characters so much more interesting than anything having to do with the characters themselves. Even disregarding that, I don’t know if it would change anything as far as my ranking, although that is due more to the fact that I like his other films more, in premise and execution.

7. Punch-Drunk Love (2002)

Punch-Drunk Love (2002) marked a sharp turn in Paul Thomas Anderson’s career. Moving away from the sprawling ensemble dramas, Anderson instead crafted a tightly contained, 90-minute romantic comedy, albeit one filtered through an anxious and unpredictable character in Adam Sandler’s Barry Egan. A lonely, emotionally volatile businessman, verbally abused by his sisters, he finds unexpected love with Emily Watson’s character, Lena. The supporting cast includes Philip Seymour Hoffman in one of the most hilarious performances I’ve seen (I rewatch the phone scene a LOT), a mattress-store owner who becomes entangled in Barry’s troubles.

This film stands out in Anderson’s filmography as both an experiment in restraint and a showcase of his ability to bring out hidden dimensions in actors. Sandler, in particular, gives a performance unlike anything he had done before or since, one that balances vulnerability, anger, and sweetness. While Punch-Drunk Love is shorter and less ambitious in scope than Boogie Nights or Magnolia, it has a surreal, dreamlike tone that makes it one of his most unique works. Personally, it’s a film I admire and appreciate more than I fully love, as I find it keeps me at a distance most of the time.

6. Inherent Vice (2014)

An adaptation of the Thomas Pynchon novel, Inherent Vice sees Paul Thomas Anderson partner with Joaquin Phoenix once again after The Master (2012), this time for a detective fiction-stoner comedy hybrid. Inherent Vice was actually my least favorite film of his until recently. I found its multiple stories kind of hard to follow, the plot a bit convoluted, and its exploration of certain characters to be underdeveloped. Upon rewatching it, however, I just surrendered to it. It’s one of those where you just have to let go and go with it rather than try to understand it, as it eventually all works out. PTA’s funniest to date, in my opinion.

While it serves as both an exploration of the hippie drug culture in the 1970’s LA scene and the political divide felt all over the nation, which is oh so relevant today, it follows Larry “Doc” Sportello investigating the disappearance of his ex-girlfriend after she had recently visited him, as well as two other cases which all seemingly relate to this event. Katherine Waterston, Reese Witherspoon, Benicio del Toro and Josh Brolin star in supporting roles, with the latter stealing the show for me. “No Cielo Drive for Bigfoot.”

5. Phantom Thread (2017)

Alma: “I think you are only acting strong.”
Reynolds: “No, I am strong.”

(…)

Alma: “Why do you act so tough? I know you’re not.”

(…)

Alma: “I want you helpless, with only me to help. And then I want you strong again.”

(…)

Reynolds: “Kiss me, my girl, before I’m sick.”

At surface level, a twisted, comedic romance, between a fashion designer and a waitress who the former takes as his muse in 1950s London, Phantom Thread (2017) is, deep down, a very fascinating study of power dynamics and the balance for control in relationships. On one side is a character who is focused entirely on work and who lets peculiar rules in his house and a projection of an idealistic image, one who is strong and tough and doesn’t let himself get attached to anyone, rule over him, and on the other is someone who won’t let herself be controlled by such things, and will stop at nothing to get what she wants/deserves. Incredible film with impeccable performances, great cinematography and score, and of course, costume design, which it won an Oscar for. While a lot of Paul Thomas Anderson’s films feature a lot of push-ins, pans and whip-pans, tilts and tracking shots, a lot of the shots here are just stills. It’s calmer. It just sits with you.

I admit this might be a bit low in the ranking considering how great it is, but it’s a testament to the rest of PTA’s filmography. That, and I only recently watched it for the first time. As I keep rewatching it for years to come, its place on my list is subject to change. However, for now, I have to put it here, as I slightly prefer his other films.

4. The Master (2012)

Joaquin Phoenix plays Freddie Quell, a wayward World War II struggling to adjust to the world after the war. He works as a photographer before getting in a fight triggered essentially by his boredom. He works in a farm before he runs away after a coworker, who Freddie says reminds him of his father, passes out after taking Freddie’s drink. A lost soul looking for guidance, he comes across Lancaster Dodd, played by Philip Seymour Hoffman, the charismatic leader of a quasi-religious movement (a cult, really) known as “the Cause”.

Lancaster Dodd is inspired by the real-life leader and founder of Scientology, L. Ron Hubbard. The Master functions partly as a study of how a religious and philosophical movement such as this, one that perpetuates gibberish based on science-fiction notions, from Alien invaders to our bodies being vessels for eternal beings, can gain a significant following, and influence people’s lives. Quell is no different than anybody else that falls prey to the teachings of Dodd. No different than anybody who seeks guidance, connection, control, meaning. The movement explores his vulnerability and lack of guidance in order to break his spirit, and enlists his help in spreading the faith.

Gorgeously shot in 70 mm, with many of the images staying with you long after the credits roll, the film boasts career-best performances from its leads. The lingering shot of Freddie as he is being “Processed” (Audited being the Scientology equivalent) by Dodd is the stand-out scene for me, with Phoenix’s raw emotions on full display. Masterful stuff (pun very much intended).

3. Magnolia (1999)

I recently wrote about Magnolia (1999) in another post; how much this movie means to me, and how my view of it has changed as I have changed since the first time I saw it. It is the first film by Paul Thomas Anderson I ever saw, and for that, for introducing me to this great filmmaker and the rest of his filmography, it will always hold a special place in my heart. It shows a day-in-the-life of 9 different characters all thinly connected between each other, all of them lost in their own way, whose lives intertwine as they are all faced with their childhood traumas and insecurities.

Magnolia is, perhaps, alongside There Will Be Blood (2007), the most operatic of PTA’s works, due to its large scope and ambition, its religious allegories and overarching themes connecting these very flawed and emotional characters. If Boogie Nights (1997) is riffing on Martin Scorsese’s works, then this film is influenced by Robert Altman, otherwise known as the “king of the ensemble piece”. To call it a simple copy, however, or even heavily influenced, even if true, is doing it a disservice, as Anderson accomplishes so much more. While not everything it tries to do lands, a film this bold and ultimately so entertaining has to be celebrated.

2. Boogie Nights (1997)

The follow-up to Hard Eight, Boogie Nights is Paul Thomas Anderson’s second feature film, and its his breakout as a voice in American cinema. Mark Wahlberg, in his best performance to date, plays Eddie Adams, a young high school dropout in 1970s California who gets discovered working at a nightclub, and reinvents himself as Dirk Diggler, a rising star in the adult film industry. Taken under the wing of veteran director Jack Horner, played by Burt Reynolds, who above all wants his films to be taken seriously, Dirk finds himself part of a surrogate family made up of fellow performers and hangers-on, including Julianne Moore’s maternal Amber Waves, John C. Reilly’s Reed Rothchild, and Philip Seymour Hoffman’s shy, lovestruck soundman Scotty. It is a sprawling ensemble, as it follows these and other characters, as they navigate the debauchery, vice and fame brought on from their time in the industry.

As I mentioned in the write-up for Magnolia, it’s easy, and perhaps correct, to say this film riffs on Scorsese’s most seminal works, Goodfellas (1990) in particular, with its long takes, needle drops, and cocaine-fueled rise-and-fall structure. But that comparison doesn’t fully capture the heart Anderson brings to the material. Beneath all the excess, it’s a story about family: broken people forming their own community in an industry that simultaneously gives them a place to belong, and then destroys them. There’s something both exhilarating and devastating in the way Anderson charts this world, never letting us forget the humanity behind the spectacle.

1. There Will Be Blood (2007)

And here it is. Quite possibly the best film of the 21^st century so far, There Will Be Blood (2007) stars Daniel Day-Lewis as Daniel Plainview, a ruthless silver prospector who reinvents himself as an oilman at the turn of the 20th century. He presents himself as a family man by adopting the son from a deceased worker, though his bond with him sits somewhere between genuine affection and a calculated tool to sell himself as trustworthy to potential investors. As Plainview builds his empire by buying land and undercutting rivals, his biggest challenge comes in the form of Eli Sunday, played by Paul Dano, a young, zealous preacher who sees Plainview’s ambition as both a blessing for his church and a threat to his authority.

Loosely inspired by Upton Sinclair’s Oil!, the film becomes less about the ins and outs of drilling and more about America’s growing appetite for power, as capitalism, religion, and ego clash on an unforgiving frontier. It serves as a deconstruction of the American myth, with Plainview being the embodiment of raw will and greed. Eli, on the other hand, cloaks his ambitions in the language of salvation, but proves equally manipulative and hungry.

Beautifully shot by Robert Elswit, you could the stop the movie at any point and end up with a frame worthy of a painting. The film also boasts an unsettling score by Jonny Greenwood, in his first collaboration with Anderson. Daniel Day-Lewis delivers what is perhaps the greatest modern performance in film history, and in my opinion, is right up there with Brando in Streetcar or De Niro in Raging Bull (1980) as a defining performance in acting. I can’t help but be absolutely mesmerized at the oil rig explosion scene (which interrupted filming of No Country for Old Men for a few days, a film which was shot nearby, and seems to be forever linked to this one, as they both were filmed around the same time, close to one another in Marfa, Texas, were both Miramax–Paramount co-productions, were released within weeks of one another in the fall of 2007, and were both awards juggernauts, with each receiving 8 Oscar nominations at the 80^th Academy Awards), as well as the baptism scene, where Day-Lewis’s complete raw vulnerability is displayed, as he is faced with the consequences of earlier actions.

The second film from PTA I’d seen after Magnolia, I was very young when I watched it for the first time, and perhaps even a little too young to fully “get it”. It was the finest display of acting I had seen up to that point, and with its ruthless characters and impressive imagery, it stayed with me. I can say it was probably watching this that made me fall truly in love with cinema, and start paying more attention to it as an art form, rather than just watch whatever was popular (it is still quite popular, as it boasts a high score on film-rating websites, such as Letterboxd and IMDB, but it wasn’t a blockbuster in any way, shape or form). I have seen it several times since, as I still look to it as one of the finest displays of what the art of cinema can accomplish. An absolute masterpiece, and in my opinion, PTA’s best.