It's Not Going to Stop / 'Til You Wise Up

The Master

**** out of ****

Directed by: Paul Thomas Anderson

Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, Laura Dern and Jesse Plemons

Running time: 137 minutes

I am a subscriber to the church of Paul Thomas Anderson, the wunderkind writer/director of Magnolia and There Will Be Blood. His latest film, The Master, is full of mesmerizing performances, exquisite characterization and an accomplished technical precision that one seldom sees on the big screen anymore – or, what is expected from one of cinema’s most strikingly original storytellers.

The Master also marks the fiery return of actor Joaquin Phoenix. He portrays erratic alcoholic Freddie Quell, a naval officer trying to adjust to life away from the shores of World War II. Freddie’s mind is frequently at sea – momentary flashbacks linger on the shiny blues of the ocean, a space of salvation that quells his irrational behaviour.

Detached from the limelight of America in the early 1950s and lost amidst the era’s mores of conservative normalcy, the Salinger-esque figure wanders away from one society and finds refuge in another. While walking around one night while drunk, he boards a boat commanded by a chivalrous, charismatic preacher of sorts named Lancaster Dodd (a mighty Philip Seymour Hoffman).

Dodd takes Freddie under his wing and becomes his spiritual commander, hoping to guide the lost, impressionable soul to nirvana. He is the leader of The Cause, a philosophical movement group that is gaining followers. In the film’s most arresting scene, Dodd submits Freddie to an intense, prolonged session of psychological questioning – what the leader terms “formal processing” – that reveals the traumas of the subject’s life.

Despite the harsh overtones of Dodd’s coldly devout wife, Peggy (Amy Adams), who is deeply concerned about the rage coming from her husband’s new friend, Freddie stays on as a follower, convinced that The Cause can save him from misery and help him find his way on solid ground. However, the process to remove sensations from the rough-edged rascal proves to be arduous for both men.

Although the copyright scrawl at the end of the credits insists that the characters bear no resemblance to real people, Dodd has many similarities to Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard. The Cause, a hackneyed belief system that focuses on capturing one’s current negative impulses to send that soul back to a state of perfection, may also sound somewhat familiar.

Phoenix is electrifying as the bottled barbaric working to extol his sins. The actor’s tight, disgruntled face masks the character’s simmering wounds to an extent, yet fissures of this aggression erupt in heated convocations with other characters.

Hoffman is just as assured a screen presence but his performance is almost sedate in comparison to Phoenix’s petulant wrath. He portrays Dodd with both an aura of profound wisdom and demure casualness, while compressing a similar rage and distaste for those who don’t align with his views.

Unlike Quell, the audience is only offered hints toward the pain that brought that character down the path to preach righteousness. However, strong supporting work from Amy Adams, fierce and unquivering in moments where she confronts her husband’s burrowed demons, hints that her character may be the master behind the exalted iconoclast.

Mastery is also abound in the film’s technical strongholds, from the choppy dissonance of Jonny Greenwood’s score, orchestrated to reflect Freddie’s tattered psyche, to the period-perfect art and costume design (courtesy of David Frank and Jack Fisk, as well as Mark Bridges). Further, the rhythms of Leslie Jones and Peter McNulty’s superb editing lingers on the raw, unhinged performances, unwilling to cut away.

As with Anderson’s other films, The Master looks at the dysfunction and unlikely reconciliation of a father-son dynamic. The director has explored the themes of incongruent family relationships in Magnolia and There Will Be Blood, while the latter film also dealt with the conflicting ideologies of avarice and faith.

The Master’s tricky power dynamics frequently shift between Freddie languishing under Dodd’s sway and the latter’s psyche becoming dominated by his protégé’s animalistic desire and sexual swells. If Freddie is an id personality, than Dodd is the superego, striving to alter his friend's desires and point his moral compass toward the sea.

Although the titular master’s identity may be up for debate, Anderson’s status as one certainly isn’t. His bold and bizarre journey into postwar American identity is a captivating and complex character study, as well as the year’s best, most daring film.