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So far my season of 90s films has been going pretty well. Now however I fear the s*it may be about to hit the fan! 
I'm about to lay into a film that many of you adore and I'm sorry about that but that's just the way it is. I was very reticent actually about posting this and truthfully I wouldn't even have dared to post it if neg rep was still around! 
Anyway onto the review my little pigeons. I've got a cat here which I'm now just going to place amongst all of you.
Plot - In the San Fernando valley, over a period of twenty four hours, we follow a large ensemble of characters and how their lives interact with each other as they search for love, forgiveness and meaning. Numerous stories weave together and intersect as the characters go through numerous life-changing experiences. These characters include Frank T.J. Mackey (Cruise), a self-help guru in the area of picking up women, his father Earl Partridge (Jason Robards), who reaches out to his son while on his deathbed. Attempting to care for Earl are his male nurse Phil Parma (Hoffman) and wife Linda (Moore). Another series of characters are linked by the hit quiz show, “What Do Kids Know?” These include its host, Jimmy Gator (Philip Baker Hall), its new young prodigy Stanley (Jeremy Blackman) and 'Quiz Kid' Donnie Smith (Macy), a former champion on the show as a child. Meanwhile Jimmy Gator's daughter Claudia (Melora Walters) is a cocaine addict whose problems bring her into contact with police officer Jim Kurring (Reilly), and a potential romance begins to spark into life.
This has got to be one of the toughest and longest viewing experiences I've had in some time. At one point as I was struggling I checked the running time, hoping to see I was at least half way though and was dismayed that I had only managed to slog my way through 45 minutes of it. I couldn't believe it! I felt like I had been there for weeks! And yet I had barely made a dent.
The best way I can think to describe it is that I felt like Magnolia was the work of a magician, but not in a positive way. I felt like I was being treated to a case of misdirection, that Anderson was attempting to convince me I was seeing something that wasn't really there. With its epic 3 hour running time, countless number of characters and its numerous inter-weaving story threads it felt like it was trying to create the sense that you were watching something deep, profound, exceptional and unprecedented. Except that personally I didn't really find that to be the case. Instead I found it to be bloated, pretentious, convoluted, contrived and self indulgent. To me the film just felt extremely smug and oh so pleased with itself. This was particularly true of its opening sequences which depict 3 urban legends which apparently prove that sometimes the seemingly impossible does actually open; basically freeing the film from any duty to adhere to logic. These resulting breaks from reality feel tonally ridiculous and just plain silly; I'm looking at you, frogs that fall from the sky! And the moment that the characters all came together for a big sing-a-long?
For me it again felt like an attempt to manipulate my feelings towards the film, that by merely making it weird and different it aims to convince me that means it's artistic or beautiful. The whole thing just felt oh so self-aware.
While I know that many people adore Anderson's direction I actually find that it can be quite irritating, especially when it comes to his trademark, Scorsese-aping, long tracking shots which don't seem to serve any purpose to the actual film itself except to show off his technical proficiency with a camera. I know that many people feel Anderson is the voice of his generation but I've got to say that outside of There Will Be Blood (which I thought was fantastic) I don't really feel like his films speak to me personally. And quite often I feel that his stylised direction just overwhelms what he is actually attempting to say.
I was able to identify and appreciate the themes that the film was attempting to touch on - guilt, remorse, loneliness, fate, coincidence, the sins of the father and the lasting effect it has on the children etc and its obvious religious/biblical connotations but I don't really see how it needed 3 hours to muse on them. Some stories do undoubtedly need such immense running times to cover everything they want to, but I didn't think this was one of them. So many of the characters and their stories seemed to be similar that it became repetitive and redundant. I imagine you could easily have trimmed some of the characters and stories, and left a good deal on the cutting room floor and still been able to tell the exact same story. You could argue that its point is relevant in portraying how so many of us are linked by these identical emotions and experiences but for a piece of cinema much of it just felt superfluous to me. And so often I just felt that the scenes went on so much longer than was really necessary. And even with its mammoth running time the film still manages to leave some unresolved threads.
I will concede to a couple of things in the film's favour. I'll give it that its a very ambitious undertaking, even if I felt it rather crumbled under the weight of such ambition. But I'll never level out severe criticism to a film-maker for being ambitious. I think it's a good thing for Hollywood to have distinctive voices such as Anderson and Tarantino, even if I don't always appreciate their efforts. And the other point I'll concede is that across the board it is superbly acted. That is especially true in the case of Tom Cruise and Philip Seymour Hoffman who were both superb in portraying quite disparate characters. Cruise was amazing as the spectacularly arrogant and despicable Frank T.J. Mackie who is eventually revealed to be hiding a deep pain. He is tremendous in the scene where he is confronted by the reporter about the truth regarding his past, saying so much with just his facial expressions as opposed to words. It's got to be one of his best performances. Cruise's scenes were a joy because they had by far the most energy and life about them. Imagine that, making something interesting. The other top performance would be Hoffman's, who is as impressive as ever as male nurse, Paul. Other impressive showings amongst the ensemble are delivered by the likes of William H. Macy, Jason Robards, Philip Baker Hall and Melora Walters. The one performance I had some reservations about was Julianne Moore's. At times I thought she was good but when expressing her grief I felt that on occasion she went way too big with it to cringingly hysterical effect.
So there you have it. I'm sure a lot of you will not agree with what I've said, and perhaps even be quite wound up by it. I only have one favour to ask - please come at me one at a time instead of joining together for a big group attack! I know this film is much-loved around these parts, including by a number of people around here I consider friends who have contributed a lot of support and appreciation for my reviews (Skepsis, Daniel, Brodinski, seanc etc) and to them I apologise. I certainly didn't set out with the intention of laying into this film that you love so much. Neither am I claiming that I have seen the truth of the film that you have failed to spot. You guys love it, and that's great. I'm just delivering my own uneducated viewpoint on the matter.
Conclusion - I can imagine Magnolia easily being a film that you don't really 'get' if you're not in the exact right frame of mind for it. So taking that into account along with the efforts of its cast and the reputation it has amongst film fans means that I probably will give it another go someday. Although at the moment I am struggling to imagine how I'll force myself to sit down for 3 hours to watch this again. It may be very impressive in numerous technical terms, and that's extremely true of the acting, but overall I just found it an overwrought experience which was over written, over directed and too often approached the depths of a soap opera.
I'm about to lay into a film that many of you adore and I'm sorry about that but that's just the way it is. I was very reticent actually about posting this and truthfully I wouldn't even have dared to post it if neg rep was still around! Anyway onto the review my little pigeons. I've got a cat here which I'm now just going to place amongst all of you.
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Year of release
1999
1999
Directed by
Paul Thomas Anderson
Paul Thomas Anderson
Written by
Paul Thomas Anderson
Paul Thomas Anderson
Starring
Tom Cruise
Philip Seymour Hoffman
William H. Macy
Julianne Moore
John C. Reilly
Jason Robards
Philip Baker Hall
Tom Cruise
Philip Seymour Hoffman
William H. Macy
Julianne Moore
John C. Reilly
Jason Robards
Philip Baker Hall
Magnolia
-
Plot - In the San Fernando valley, over a period of twenty four hours, we follow a large ensemble of characters and how their lives interact with each other as they search for love, forgiveness and meaning. Numerous stories weave together and intersect as the characters go through numerous life-changing experiences. These characters include Frank T.J. Mackey (Cruise), a self-help guru in the area of picking up women, his father Earl Partridge (Jason Robards), who reaches out to his son while on his deathbed. Attempting to care for Earl are his male nurse Phil Parma (Hoffman) and wife Linda (Moore). Another series of characters are linked by the hit quiz show, “What Do Kids Know?” These include its host, Jimmy Gator (Philip Baker Hall), its new young prodigy Stanley (Jeremy Blackman) and 'Quiz Kid' Donnie Smith (Macy), a former champion on the show as a child. Meanwhile Jimmy Gator's daughter Claudia (Melora Walters) is a cocaine addict whose problems bring her into contact with police officer Jim Kurring (Reilly), and a potential romance begins to spark into life.
This has got to be one of the toughest and longest viewing experiences I've had in some time. At one point as I was struggling I checked the running time, hoping to see I was at least half way though and was dismayed that I had only managed to slog my way through 45 minutes of it. I couldn't believe it! I felt like I had been there for weeks! And yet I had barely made a dent.
The best way I can think to describe it is that I felt like Magnolia was the work of a magician, but not in a positive way. I felt like I was being treated to a case of misdirection, that Anderson was attempting to convince me I was seeing something that wasn't really there. With its epic 3 hour running time, countless number of characters and its numerous inter-weaving story threads it felt like it was trying to create the sense that you were watching something deep, profound, exceptional and unprecedented. Except that personally I didn't really find that to be the case. Instead I found it to be bloated, pretentious, convoluted, contrived and self indulgent. To me the film just felt extremely smug and oh so pleased with itself. This was particularly true of its opening sequences which depict 3 urban legends which apparently prove that sometimes the seemingly impossible does actually open; basically freeing the film from any duty to adhere to logic. These resulting breaks from reality feel tonally ridiculous and just plain silly; I'm looking at you, frogs that fall from the sky! And the moment that the characters all came together for a big sing-a-long?
For me it again felt like an attempt to manipulate my feelings towards the film, that by merely making it weird and different it aims to convince me that means it's artistic or beautiful. The whole thing just felt oh so self-aware. While I know that many people adore Anderson's direction I actually find that it can be quite irritating, especially when it comes to his trademark, Scorsese-aping, long tracking shots which don't seem to serve any purpose to the actual film itself except to show off his technical proficiency with a camera. I know that many people feel Anderson is the voice of his generation but I've got to say that outside of There Will Be Blood (which I thought was fantastic) I don't really feel like his films speak to me personally. And quite often I feel that his stylised direction just overwhelms what he is actually attempting to say.
Film Trivia Snippets - Paul Thomas Anderson actually wrote the large bulk of Magnolia's script during a two week spell he spent at the Vermont cabin of William H. Macy. The reason that he was able to get so much work done was down to the fact he had seen a snake and was afraid to go outside. Anderson also went above and beyond the normal tasks of a director by designing the Magnolia poster as well as cutting together the trailers to promote the film. /// In the infomercials for Frank TJ Mackie's “Seduce and Destory” program they give out the telephone number (877) TAME-HER. If you called the number at the time of the film's release you would hear a recording of Tom Cruise giving the Seduce and Destroy pitch. /// Not everything went smoothly on the casting front for Anderson. He wanted Burt Reynolds to appear in the movie, but after Anderson upset him during the promotional tour for Boogie Nights, Reynolds turned him down. And for the role of Earl Partridge, Anderson approached George C. Scott but was roundly rebuffed. Scott threw the script across the room, calling it the “worst f*cking thing I've ever read. The language is terrible!” The character of Earl Partridge was eventually portrayed by Jason Robards
I will concede to a couple of things in the film's favour. I'll give it that its a very ambitious undertaking, even if I felt it rather crumbled under the weight of such ambition. But I'll never level out severe criticism to a film-maker for being ambitious. I think it's a good thing for Hollywood to have distinctive voices such as Anderson and Tarantino, even if I don't always appreciate their efforts. And the other point I'll concede is that across the board it is superbly acted. That is especially true in the case of Tom Cruise and Philip Seymour Hoffman who were both superb in portraying quite disparate characters. Cruise was amazing as the spectacularly arrogant and despicable Frank T.J. Mackie who is eventually revealed to be hiding a deep pain. He is tremendous in the scene where he is confronted by the reporter about the truth regarding his past, saying so much with just his facial expressions as opposed to words. It's got to be one of his best performances. Cruise's scenes were a joy because they had by far the most energy and life about them. Imagine that, making something interesting. The other top performance would be Hoffman's, who is as impressive as ever as male nurse, Paul. Other impressive showings amongst the ensemble are delivered by the likes of William H. Macy, Jason Robards, Philip Baker Hall and Melora Walters. The one performance I had some reservations about was Julianne Moore's. At times I thought she was good but when expressing her grief I felt that on occasion she went way too big with it to cringingly hysterical effect.
So there you have it. I'm sure a lot of you will not agree with what I've said, and perhaps even be quite wound up by it. I only have one favour to ask - please come at me one at a time instead of joining together for a big group attack!
I know this film is much-loved around these parts, including by a number of people around here I consider friends who have contributed a lot of support and appreciation for my reviews (Skepsis, Daniel, Brodinski, seanc etc) and to them I apologise. I certainly didn't set out with the intention of laying into this film that you love so much. Neither am I claiming that I have seen the truth of the film that you have failed to spot. You guys love it, and that's great. I'm just delivering my own uneducated viewpoint on the matter. Conclusion - I can imagine Magnolia easily being a film that you don't really 'get' if you're not in the exact right frame of mind for it. So taking that into account along with the efforts of its cast and the reputation it has amongst film fans means that I probably will give it another go someday. Although at the moment I am struggling to imagine how I'll force myself to sit down for 3 hours to watch this again. It may be very impressive in numerous technical terms, and that's extremely true of the acting, but overall I just found it an overwrought experience which was over written, over directed and too often approached the depths of a soap opera.