criterionforum.org

pzadvance wrote:the flashback is to Doris
...
I don't recall a mention of her having a sister in either the film or the script.

wigwam wrote:

pzadvance wrote:the flashback is to Doris
...
I don't recall a mention of her having a sister in either the film or the script.

oh that's Doris? At the beginning someone asks him what he's reading and he says "a letter from the little sister of a girl I knew" and in the flashback they're talking about how she's 16 and I didn't get that she was Doris

wigwam wrote:right i caught those but in the scene w/ her on the bench i got that she was the younger sister of his gf Doris who was writing to him while he was away because Doris didnt care anymore

Jim Emerson wrote:I was intrigued while I watched it, but never got caught up in it, emotionally, intellectually or cinematically. It's one of those movies that, even in a vivid 70mm presentation, I viewed as if from a great distance -- like I was sitting way back in the theater instead of up front. I'd seen headlines and tweets from other critics who saw "The Master" in Venice and Toronto, and the ones that weren't raves looked like tentative, ambivalent, qualified assessments -- people saying things like "I need to see it again before I can be sure..." In that sense, it's a film like "The Tree of Life" that many weren't sure they "got" until they saw it again. (In my case, it was the second viewing that convinced me I thought too much of it was twaddle.) And, as with "Tree of Life," I've now read some of the reviews exalting the movie as a masterpiece and don't have much sense of what the film's champions saw in it that made them so enthusiastic.

Black Hat wrote:On the criticism that Freddy had to change or at least change his tactics. First, why must this happen?

Second, his tactics were not up to him, Dodd & The Cause were in charge of them and in that I think it further exposed its flaws, especially in further contextualizing Freddy that culminated at the end of the film.

Third, wouldn't the fact that a person like Freddy allowed himself to accept, 'the help' of others, regardless of how we might feel about it, be indicative of him changing his tactics?

Guido wrote:Also, I feel like all this talk of "change" and "proactivity" and "progression" points to a specific need to understand or know a character according to some external, all-encompassing prism through which human nature is made digestible. Perhaps the frame of reference through which we understand a character, or perceive him/her to grow, is just as constructed and ultimately false.

And last but not least, if Quell had undergone a significant change in personality and development, would it not validate The Cause's system of belief? Quell is so damaged that any self-initiated process of growth is unlikely, and what comes to the rescue is something that only aggravates his present condition. It's my understanding that we're dealing with a man suffering from mental illness, who copes with that illness through self-abuse, and who encounters a system that fools him into believing that said illness can be alleviated if not erased by way of specific tactics. Bullshit tactics, of course. Kinda sounds like the way governments on this continent deal with mental illness, only in their case, it's manipulation by way of ignorance. But I digress.

I'd agree with the comment a few pages back that the film doesn't necessarily have to be regarded as either a misfire or a masterpiece. Somewhere in between is good for me. I'll post more as I take it all in.

But the mere existence of a gray area will not stop me from labeling it a misfire if that is how I see it.

A question about the film's chemistry: can one really mix paint thinner, whiskey, etc., in any proportion, and drink it, in any amount, and not die?

Jim Emerson wrote:The critics agree! Paul Thomas Anderson's new film "The Master" is... ambiguous. What they don't agree on is whether, as we say in the software world, that's a bug or a feature. Is the movie "demanding" and artfully elusive, challenging audiences by refusing to offer a conventional dramatic catharsis or provide an artificially wrapped-up ending; or is the thing just vague, opaque, muddled? The answer depends on who you ask, what they think of Anderson as a filmmaker and, possibly, what they expected going in: a historical exposé of Scientology, a portrait of post-war/micd-century America, "character study," an acting duel...

swo17 wrote:Maybe I'm just a false prophet but...

swo17 wrote:

Spoiler

An even more interesting question, to my mind: Who is the master of the Master?

swo17 wrote:

Spoiler

Who/what is the original master?

Aspect wrote:Warren Oates is absolutely right when he says that The Master lacks story. A plot is not the story; rather it's the storyline, the map, or order, of events utilized in order to tell the story. The story is the creative heart of the work; the characters (and their traits), the setting, the object he finds, his goals, and all the details of things that happen along the way. The Master has a plot in that the events of the story are somewhat organized, though it is somewhat chaotic. The reason there's discussion generated by the film is because people are trying to figure out what the barely articulated or illustrated themes of the story are. They're also attempting to provide background to the characters that the movie doesn't bother to present. It's interesting that people are only focusing on Freddie, who starts the film as an animal and ends the film as an animal who's had one more experience of many, but who shows little to no understanding of what actually happened to him. Freddie's an interesting, yet pretty stable character. That's a major problem when we're talking about story. But let's forget about Freddie for now, there's been enough talk about him.

What the hell is the deal with Lancaster Dodd? Where does he come from? Where did he go to school? What kinds of writings did he produce before "The Cause?" Why did he decide to start a religion? What is he trying to find out about people and about himself by doing this? What are his motives? Absolutely none of this is in the movie, which makes Dodd's character essentially meaningless except as someone who wants to tame the wild Freddie. What I found bizarre is that the movie didn't really portray Dodd as a huckster. He seemed to believe what he was doing and got offended to his core when anyone criticized him and his writings. The movie played him straight, when it would have been so much more interesting to have him portrayed as a snake-oil salesman.

Perhaps this was PTA's attempt to distinguish Dodd from L. Ron Hubbard, but it just doesn't really work. His son knows he's making it all up, yet Dodd seems to believe his own hokum. L. Ron Hubbard certainly didn't believe his own hokum. He was a struggling sci-fi author who decided to create a religion. In the introduction to one of his books (can't remember the name of the collection now), Harlan Ellison claims to have been with Hubbard the night Scientology (or Dianetics, as it was called then) was born. During the 1950s, many New York authors and artists would gather to talk about writing and life. Hubbard would sit in the corner with a typewriter and actually write during these parties. He would stop and talk about stuff when people came up to him. He churned out stories by the ton. One night, he got exasperated and said he was tired of living from story to story and selling stories to magazines to pay his rent. He asked how the hell authors are expected to make any money? Someone came up to him and told him to start a religion, that's where the money's at. So he did, and it worked. He became rich beyond his wildest dreams.

Great story, right? Better and more humorous than anything in The Master, which treats everything with such deadly, plodding earnestness that one wonders what happened to the young PTA who had so much fun with the porno milieu of 1970s San Fernando Valley. That movie told a story, and did it without a boring moment. We knew more about the characters at the end than we did at the beginning. It wasn't a waste of time from a story perspective. People like to be told stories. That's why average film goers (and some perceptive critics like Jim Emerson and Roger Ebert) are saying the film is a bit of a waste. Aside from its beautiful aesthetic qualities, the film is lacking in many fundamental areas. I kind of wish Anderson would have taken in a writing partner on this one. He needed someone to help him flesh out his characters and integrate them in a satisfactory way to the ideas he was trying to get across. He needed someone to clarify his ideas. Great stories are interesting in their implications and should not be hard to understand. People are confused by this movie because Anderson himself was confused when he was writing and making it. This is all very clear in every interview he's given for the film up to this date. People are looking for, and providing, ideas and motivations that aren't actually present in the film itself.

Seriously, who is Dodd? How can we care about any of the characters and understand their emotions if they are barely sketched in by the writer and only presented in the vaguest terms? This is one of those movies that is more fun to talk about and figure out where it went wrong than it is to actually watch. I think people who love this movie need to realize that they love it despite its thin story. Not every movie is perfect, and this one is far from it. It's artful in places, but too unsure of its content to make any real lasting impact.