Abandon all expectations, all ye who enter the emotional, dysfunctional, pathological, mystical, coincidental and ultimately wonderful world of Magnolia.
The only thing you can count on is this: You will either love this film to pieces or hate it to death.
Magnolia, opening in theatres today, is writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson's follow-up to Boogie Nights, his Oscar-nominated exploration of love and longing set against the backdrop of the '80s porn industry.
Where Boogie Nights was focused on one particular subculture, Magnolia opens up and looks at the late '90s as a whole, as seen through the eyes of a group of loosely connected Los Angeles residents.
Similar to Robert Altman's Short Cuts, Magnolia shifts back and forth between storylines that deal with the ordinary experiences of life, but the characters and their situations are far from mundane.
The film has two main story spines: one centres on Jason Robards as a TV producer on his deathbed, drifting between semiconscious ramblings and all too lucid regrets. Julianne Moore is his young gold-digging wife, who realizes too late that she loves him; Philip Seymour Hoffman is the male nurse with a platonic adoration for Robards' character and Tom Cruise is the old man's estranged son, an infomercial sex guru.
Paralleling this group is the story of another dying father, that of a children's quiz show host played by Phillip Baker Hall, who wants to reconcile with his cocaine-addicted daughter (Melora Walters). Connected to this storyline are the experiences of a child genius (Jeremy Blackman) who only wants the respect of his father, an LAPD cop (John C. Reilly) who falls for the coke addict, and an adult version of the kid genius (William H. Macy), also looking for love and fulfilment.
Trying to detail all of the emotional journeys these remarkable characters have to undertake would fill up a page or more. Suffice to say the characters are, without exception, unforgettable. Moore and Cruise in particular give standout performances.
But director Anderson hasn't made a standard-issue soap opera here. Overseeing the themes of love, regret, redemption and parent-child relationships is the common assumption that anything can - and will - happen.
At one point, a character starts to sing along with one of Aimee Mann's haunting soundtrack songs. Then, incredibly, the scene shifts to another character - who picks up the song and sings along for a line or two. And so on, until all the main characters have performed.
It's a showstopper of a moment because it drives home the point that Anderson will freely drift between reality and surreality, daring you to keep up - or even tell one from the other.
And late in the film, when all the storylines have advanced to the point where they must either be resolved or abandoned, Anderson delivers a bizarre climax that will smack audiences across the face.
Some will be blown away by its mesmerizing audacity, others will cry foul. We won't reveal it here, except to say it appears in the Bible in Exodus 8:2 (references to which pop up subliminally throughout the movie.)
Magnolia is a risky, creative tour de force that overcomes its odd flaw through some of the most incredible and memorable performances in recent years. The film is almost cocky in its willingness to defy convention, but it does it so damned well that when the end does come, after a whopping 3 1/4 hours, it seems too soon.
(This film is rated AA)
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