The Master (2012)

User Review

• 

  Barneyonmovies

  4 / 10

  WHAT I LIKED: Paul Thomas Anderson's 'The Master,' is about a confused, vulnerable man being indoctrinated by a cult. The cult in question is based on L. Rob Hubbard's early Scientology, here headed by a fictional man called Lancaster Dodd (Philip Seymour Hoffman), whilst the victim is a troubled World War 2 Navy veteran called Freddie Quell (Joaquin Phoenix).
  
  The film is almost entirely made up of Dodd's repeated efforts to convert Freddie's fragile mind with his manipulative speeches and pseudo experiments, and watching Freddie trying to make sense of it all is vaguely captivating at times. That's particularly true because the two central performances are so committed, and because the cinematography and Johnny Greenwood's score are so magnificent to behold.
  
  WHAT I DIDN'T LIKE: For the first hour or so you do hope that Freddie might find some meaning in something else, but it soon becomes clear that he's a lost cause. Then you're simply left with those endless scenes of Dodd's nonsensical exercises, and that becomes repetitive and exhausting pretty quickly. Before long, the film starts to feel both self-indulgent, and completely aimless.
  
  It's rare that Paul Thomas Anderson drops the ball like this, but when he does, it's because he disappears too far up his own backside and becomes more interested in building evocative scenes than serving an overarching story or set of themes. As such, 'The Master,' ends almost as pointlessly as it begins, with no real development for its characters, or statements on their world.
  
  VERDICT: Like its cult leader character, Paul Thomas Anderson's 'The Master,' is dazzling in some ways, but also impenetrable, self-important and ultimately aimless.

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