The Master (2012)
I've now completed Paul Thomas Anderson's filmography (feature films) and I officially LOVE all his movies! This one was certainly no exception.
This film triumphs visually, musically, acting-wise (also because of the great characters) and narratively! It is one big bomb of quality.
Some memorable moments were: the moments with the naked woman of sand; the 'model' walking around the store, trying to sell her fur coat with the 50s music on the background; the first 'session' with The Master; the discussion between the master and John More; the jail scene; Freddie walking from the wall to the window; the motorcycle scene; the scene in the cinema where he gets the 'call' (dreamed or not...); The last meeting with The Master; The final scene; etc.
It's basically a wonderful, subtle character study of a war veteran (Freddie Quell) who tries to find a kind of 'peace' in his tortured soul. One of his drunk nights brings him to a ship where he comes into contact with a group of people who call themselves 'The Cause'. They are led by a charismatic leader, named 'The Master'. After some friendly chats and some psychological/hypnotic sessions, their personalities start connecting in a strange kind of way. Freddie starts to believe in 'The Cause' and its vague methods and ideas and follows The Master in everything he does. He hopes he can find his own peace of mind with the help of these ideas (subconsciously).
During the course of the story, however, he meets a lot of people who question the ideas of The Master. At first he fights those people (literally), but at a certain point he begins to realize that all the ideas of 'The Cause' are empty, meaningless and NOT the truth and peace he is looking for. He drives away to freedom and after another disappointment in real life and a last visit to The Master, he becomes his own drunk self again (with some more experience and less agression in him) and continues his fickle life course...
Brilliant.
There are of course way more layers to the story (religious and political layers for example), but the main story itself was already very interesting and appealing to me.