With pick 267 Team Clint Eastwood selects Magnolia (1999) in the Best Picture category*.
*winner at Berlin film festival
"Now that I've met you, would you object to never seeing me again?"
A grandoise, Altman-esque drama-epic that tells the story of several inextricably-linked characters; chance, destiny, dashed hopes and dreams, and redemption drive the intertwined storyline that binds them. As the follow-up to his highly-regarded Boogie Nights, director PT Anderson was granted free reign on this picture and his (sometimes excessive) ambition shows: this film occupies its own territory and is one of the standout movie experiences of my life. The performances from a deep, strong cast are fantastic and the filmmaking is masterful.
The acting: then relative-backgrounder John C. Reilly provides IMO the core to an ensemble of heavyhitters, including Philip Seymor Hoffman, William H. Macy, Julianne Moore, and a highly-praised showing from everyone's favorite scientologist, Tom Cruise. Marvellous turns from the top flight talent simply act as a marquee to a supporting cast that match the leads scene for scene - the relationship between a quiz show whiz kid and his pushy father is executed perfectly - neither actor instantly recognizable - and mirrored beautifully by the Macy character, himself once a quiz show wunderkind, now an emotionally crippled former star. Cruise effectively parodies his alpha-male celebrity status (at least, as it was in 1999), and is alternatingly hilarious as the creator of a misogynistic female seduction program and more dramatically competent than one might expect in some of his more dour scenes. As mentioned, though, it is Reilly who really anchors the film with a knockout performance as a love-starved straight-and-narrow cop who tries to make it work with a junkie. Anderson succeeds fully in drawing humor and heartache from his cast, and Reilly is superb in providing both.
The movie runs long, but at 3+ hours time flies thanks to Anderson's verve. He orchestrates the oft-jumping storylines perfectly, and I think the key to the seamless exposition is his use of music - the score dictates the mood of every sequence and so even the most disparate of scenes mesh together. Big time props go to singer Aimee Mann (Anderson's muse during the writing phase of this project - the quote I used at the top is both a line from one of her songs and dialogue in the movie), who provides a couple of original songs, one of which is used to score one of Anderson's braver choices: a full-cast singalong that occurs during the late-going. He employs an eclectic range of stylistic devices that wonderfully complement the story; a narrated prologue sets the tone for the film perfectly, and a dynamic, moving camera in many of the scenes - one in particular is a lengthy, unedited tracking shot that follows a character into and around a television studio. Depressing as it can be at times, the film always has an exuberant, endearing feeling to it.
The climax - involving frogs - is one of the more shattering and outrageous I have seen. The film does a magnificent job of building tension up to this point, making the climax an explosive experience on several levels. Again, the way Anderson is able to draw together various techniques and exploit them for the benefit of the story shows incredible skill. This is a great, great movie, and I agree with one of the movie-poster critic quotes that calls it "highly unmissable".
