It’s not going to stop. Til you wise up.
I’ve always loved Paul Thomas Anderson’s films. But only now in my middle age have I realized that he’s our most humanist filmmaker.
And Magnolia is his humanist triumph. Everyone in this film is deeply flawed or alienated and suffering. It is raining everywhere.
It is a film of traumas and resentments made into crimes and cruelty.
And yet the film never judges its characters. It practices deep empathy - even with the most horrible people and in the darkest situations.
And somehow it allows redemption. A miracle. A moment that the narrator at the beginning of the film would clearly recognize as beyond coincidence. Something that the sages might recognize as atonement.
It might be PTA’s best film. It’s absolutely Tom Cruise’s finest performance. Aimee Mann’s soundtrack is the most underrated in film history.
A masterpiece for all time.