The Master

I saw all of PTA’s work from the 2000s and 2010s as a teenager almost a decade ago leading up to Phantom Thread, which I saw in theaters when it came out. And though I always loved movies, this was the time where I was really starting to cling to specific directors and styles of films to inform/discover what kind of films I really liked. I was always entranced by PTA’s films. There was always a certain texture to the visuals, and a certain weight to the themes that had me thinking about them long after I would see them, even if I didn’t fully comprehend all of them. All these years later, I’ve watched so much more (including some of PTA’s films from the 90’s, one of which I see as being part of my favorite films ever), and I have a much better understanding of what i like, and even how to better understand what a filmmaker is trying to convey. With his return to movies coming this year, I look forward to going back and rewatching all those PTA films and getting even more out of them. LOVE this. Pretty much everything about this film is perfect. It’s somehow so serene while at the same time bursting with insanity. Nestled in between the amazing cinematography and performances is an allegory that is both somewhat hard to fully pin down, but also so straightforward that it jumps out at you. This leads to several variations in how people interpret the core themes, but the central ideas (control, subservience, man’s destructive but freeing instincts - how these two intermingle and clash) remain intact in everyone’s thoughts. These are the kinds of films I love the most- where there is a distinct and direct vision on the part of the filmmaker, but enough room for everyone to parse through that vision with their own lenses. Just plain all time great stuff.