The Master (Jo****1/2)

Paul Thomas Anderson has quickly become one of the premiere filmmakers of our time. His films are not only filled with striking imagery, they are also filled with potent ideas, and words, and characters. From There Will Be Blood and now to The Master, Anderson continually challenges his audience to follow increasingly disturbed characters and concepts.

Following Freddie Quell (Joaquin Phoenix), a drifter, drunk, and degenerate, the story stumbles onto a group of believers, led by the 'Master,' Lancaster Dodd, a man who is both a thinker, philosopher, and founder of a new religious movement: The Cause. Quell is clearly an ill fit for the group. Consumed by sexual desires and his need for liquor, Dodd sees something in him, a spark of curiosity, sending them both down a rabbit hole of discovery and doubt.

The film has raised controversy as it relates to Scientology, whether or not the film is based on the religion is up to the viewer. Perhaps that controversy is why The Master missed out on so many key Oscar nominations. It was simply too difficult a film for Hollywood to embrace.

Luckily, they did not forget the key players. Joaquin Phoenix, in a triumphant return to films, is simply out of body in his performance. There is quite simply no better commitment to acting on screen this year, and if the Oscars have any justice to them at all, Phoenix would walk away with Best Actor easily. Hoffman, too, is in top form. In what is arguably the film's second leading role, he was nominated instead for Best Supporting Actor - a wholly deserved nomination. And his wife, played by Amy Adams, also receiving a Supporting Actress nomination (her 4th). Here we see Adams so much more subdued than her previous roles: committed, collected, unsettling.

And such striking photography, too. Why this film missed a Cinematography nomination is beyond me. Shot on actual film (what a shock) - the compositions Anderson finds with his DP is truly the best work of the year.

What more can I say? This is a film that will not have a wide acceptance among people, as it has already proved. It is challenging, slow-paced, disturbing, and almost always brilliant. In 50 years from now, The Master may very well be remembered as the masterpiece The Oscars forgot...

(Awards potential: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Phoenix), Best Actor (Hoffman), Best Supporting Actress (Adams), Best Original Screenplay, Best Editing, Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction, Best Original Score)