Movie Review: The Master

I made a special trip to Knoxville to see The Master on the wide screen.  There's no substitute.  I saw One Flew Over the Cukoo's Nest in the theatre when I was about ten years old from whence came my appreciation.  However, I rarely go to the movies anymore because most of what plays is pop culture shit that offends my visual and auditory senses.

So I heard that one of my favorite directors, Paul Thomas Anderson [Boogy Nights, There Will Be Blood] had filmed a screenplay he wrote that loosly followed L. Ron Hubbard's (played by Philip Seymour Hoffman) life juxtaposed with the existence of a trampled human being, played by Jacquin Phoenix.  The film follows the two and Hoffman's pack of brainwashed congregants around the western hemisphere.  It's the interplay between the characters that amazed me so.  On the downside, the film had no object.  For example, in There Will Be Blood (best film I've ever seen with the worst title I've ever read), the object for Daniel Plainview was to make enough money to seclude himself from humanity, which he hated both individually and in the aggregate.  And the object was achieved.  The movie flowed nicely along his ambitious journey into his Biltmore-esque mansion where it ended beautifully, with the line "I'm finished!"

Although The Master clawed its way into territory I've never before witnessed on film, it simply cannot be said to be better than There Will Be Blood.  I say this because Rolling Stone magazine stated that Master was perhaps the best film of the decade.  I don't think that There Will Be Blood is ten years old, so the statement cannot bear this weight.  However, assuming the classic is older than that, then Master has a chance because it is indeed a great work of art.   At the same time, this statement speaks sadly about the state of American film industry; i.e., this film should easily be topped, but it's not.

B+