Review of Inherent Vice (2014) by Charlie P — 18 Jan 2015

Paul Thomas Anderson's Inherent Vice, his adaptation of the gonzo-noir detective novel from the great recluse Thomas Pynchon, isn't as strong a film as I'm accustomed to seeing from the man who is perhaps the greatest filmmaker of his generation. It's hard to say where things falter. Anderson is incapable of composing a dull shot or any scene that doesn't reverberate with unlimited possibilities for exploring the twisted sides of human nature. Inherent Vice is bursting with laughs, heart, style, ingenuity and amazing performances. It's worth seeing it more than once and is the unmistakable work of a real master.

Still, it's a bit of a slog. What may hamper this latest Anderson film is the fact that Anderson is almost too faithful to Pynchon, an undisputed literary genius on par with James Joyce. He's almost cautious in approaching the bizarro world of Pynchon, a recluse to rival J.D. Salinger. This isn't an attempt to bring the more challenging Pynchon works to the screen, such as Gravity's Rainbow or even The Crying of Lot 49. Inherent Vice is more accessible. he film is set in Southern California circa 1970 (the year Anderson was born) just as the psychedelic 60's were giving way to the cynical 70's, personified by Manson, Altamont, Nixon and a collective embrace of self-absorption. Inherent Vice is teeming on the spirit of pot and psychedelics laced with fleeting ideals, and it's also terrific fun. Right up Anderson's alley.

Anderson could pull off this material all by himself, but Pynchon is with him every step of the way. Immediately we're introduced to our guide in the form of Larry 'Doc' Sportello (Joaquin Phoenix), a P.I. lost in a perpetual haze in his beach bungalow. Phoenix, unkempt and unwashed, inhabits the role like only he can. He awaken one morning by a surprise visitor. His ex, Shasta Fay Hepworth, played with playful carnality by Katherine Waterston (daughter of Sam). Like any old dame in the crime fiction tradition of Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett, she is need of his help. But there' smore. Before the plot kicks in we get voice-over from Doc's ex-assistant, Sortilege (singer-songwriter Joanna Newsom). And she has words about Shasta:

"She came along the alley and up the back steps the way she always used to. Doc hadn't seen her for over a year. Nobody had. Back then it was always sandals, bottom half of a flower-print bikini, faded Country Joe & the Fish T-shirt. Tonight she was all in flatland gear, hair a lot shorter than he remembered, looking just like she swore she'd never look.".

Newsom renders the words beautifully and they're taken straight from Pynchon's book, it's the very first paragraph. Anderson makes no bones about tipping his hat to Pynchon, he does it a lot. It's uncharacteristic of a filmmaker that is so skillful at showing rather than telling. His previous films have all masterfully allowed the story to flow from his own fevered visions. There Will Be Blood was adapted from Upton Sinclair's 1927 novel Oil!, but Anderson's version rendered it unrecognizable. Inherent Vice is not the work of Anderson alone, and thus the film feels constricted.

But the movie is still full of pleasures. The plot, as it is, kicks in when Shasta convinces Doc to locate her new love, Mickey Wolfmann (Eric Roberts), a real-estate tycoon whose wife is looking to have institutionalized. His search leads him through a Los Angeles full of surfers, biker gangs, New-Agers, acid heads, tax-dodging dentists and a mystery consortium known as the Golden Fang. The mood has the loose, trippy feel of 1973's The Long Goodbye, a mesmerizing update of Raymond Chandler's private eye Philip Marlowe (Elliot Gould) from director Robert Altman, whose work is wired into Anderson's DNA. You barely have time to smell the weed before a cavalcade of characters zoom in and out, like a coke-addled dentist (Martin Short, amazing) who has a thing for an underage heiress (Sasha Pieterse), an AWOL musician (Owen Wilson) with a junkie for a wife (Jena Malone), an assistant D.A. (Reese Witherspoon) who takes Doc to bed and a lawyer (Benicio Del Toro) who keeps Doc on his toes. It's a bit of an overload, especially considering the novels interlude in Las Vegas is left out of the film. The period atmosphere also leaves something to be desired since the amazing cinematographer Robert Elswit is largely restricted to close-ups.

Still, the actors are all aces, especially Josh Brolin, who gives the film a electrifying charge as buzz-cut cop Bigfoot Bjornsen, who also works as an extra on the television show Adam-12. Brolin is not only funny as hell, he gives the most tender performance when he opens up to Doc to reveal who he really is.

And that's Inherent Vice, brilliantly scored by Anderson regular Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead, an Anderson mind-bender that will leave you dazzled, even if it also leaves you confused and frustrated. But always you are in the hands of a true master.