Review of Phantom Thread (2017) by Andrewburge — 13 Apr 2018

You know the phrase "Beauty lies on the inside". It is often used in reference to something which has an unpleasant appearance but is pleasant beneath. Well, it is the other way around with 'Phantom Thread', Paul Thomas Anderson's newest subtle portrayal of the complex dark emotions lying deep beneath us.

Indeed, this is a film which looks and sounds brilliant, sophisticated, pretentious and even luxurious. The soundtrack, while subtle and not very catchy, is present very often and at times being present only as hums and delicate occasional touches on its piano chords. But, its beauty hides complex sorrows and near masochistic principles of which, the most obvious are the ones of its lead character, Reynolds Woodcock, a renowned dressmaker with a obsessive compulsive routine, portrayed brilliantly by the exclusive Daniel Day-Lewis. He demands absolute silence at breakfast, he cuts his nose and ear hairs with absolute precision, but what destroys him most is his obsession with his work.

Indeed, when he meets Alma, a German girl, he constantly complements her perfect form, but does he really love her, or she sees her as an idealistic model for his dresses. Well, in the end he loves her, but still under his own principles and rules. These rules are never ever set apart for anything as his sister and assistant, Cyril, a by-the-book woman is always by his side... Always!

Paul Thomas Anderson often presents the darkest human emotions and desires through subtle and disturbing acts. Yet in this movie he also masks them with visual and auditory elegance. These are slowly stripped away as we are pulled closer into their minds, like Woodcock's sorrow over the death of his mother, claiming: "it is comforting to know the dead watch over the living. I don't find that spooky at all". Yet the unusual love between him and Alma is decomposed as she occasionally poisons him with mushrooms just enough for him to get sick so he can care for him and be with him, Yet despite him knowing that, he does not mind. In fact he finds pleasure in it. It is an uneasy psychological game in which they engage portraying their sanity-altering self-absorbed nobility-principled line of thoughts.