Magnolia ***** (1999, Tom Cruise, Jason Robards, Julianne Moore, Philip Seymour Hoffman) – Classic Movie Review 319

In 2000 Tom Cruise won the Golden Globe as Best Supporting Actor and his third Oscar nomination, playing one of the dozen main characters of this brilliant, quite extraordinary multi-drama of intertwined lives unfolding one cataclysmic day in the San Fernando Valley of southern California. The original screenplay, also Oscar nominated, is another triumph for the writer-director of Boogie Nights, Paul Thomas Anderson.

Aimee Mann was Oscar and Golden Globe nominated for Best Original Song for ‘Save Me’. So three Oscar nominations but surprisingly no wins this time.

The characters and half-dozen stories — all on easy-to-relate-to themes like families, friends, failure and forgiveness — are uniformly on target, whether amusing, disturbing or emotional. The actors bite on the script like they’ve been starved of good parts all these years. Jason Robards Jr touches the heart as a father who lies dying, while his young wife (Julianne Moore), who married him for his money, finds she really loves him.

Cruise is exceptional, too, as Robards’ estranged son, an obnoxiously smarmy TV guru. At 188 minutes, it’s a long, riveting epic film, driven by a marvellous soundtrack, builds to the most extraordinary storm climax ever seen in the movies. It’s got masterpiece written all over it.

Anderson’s regular cinematographer Robert Elswit provides the genius visuals. Anderson’s regular actors appear to great effect: Philip Baker Hall, John C Reilly, Philip Seymour Hoffman (as Phil Parma) and William H Macy.

Tragically, Philip Seymour Hoffman died on February 2 2014, aged 46, from an apparent drug overdose  in his New York City apartment. Awarded a Best Actor Oscar for the 2005 film Capote, he checked into rehab in May 2013 for heroin use.

Born in Fairport, New York, in 1967, Hoffman began his career in the early 1990s with a guest role in TV’s Law & Order, but broke through to the movies in 1992 in four films, including Scent of a Woman.

He acted in The Getaway and Nobody’s Fool, and five films for Paul Thomas Anderson, Hard Eight, Boogie Nights, Magnolia, Punch-Drunk Love and The Master, as well as earning acclaim for his performances in Happiness, Flawless, The Talented Mr Ripley, Red Dragon, Almost Famous and Capote. He was currently filming The Hunger Games: Mockingjay.

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http://derekwinnert.com/boogie-nights-classic-film-review-272/

(C) Derek Winnert 2013 Classic Movie Review 319 derekwinnert.com

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