24 hours in L.A.; it’s raining cats and dogs. Two parallel and intercut stories dramatize men about to die: both are estranged from a grown child, both want to make contact, and neither child wants anything to do with dad. Earl Partridge’s son is a charismatic misogynist; Jimmy Gator’s daughter is a cokehead and waif. A mild and caring nurse intercedes for Earl, reaching the son; a prayerful and upright beat cop meets the daughter, is attracted to her, and leads her toward a new calm. Meanwhile, guilt consumes Earl’s young wife, while two whiz kids, one grown and a loser and the other young and pressured, face their situations. The weather, too, is quirky. –IMDb
With his 1997 film Boogie Nights, then-27-year-old director Paul Thomas Anderson took his place on the list of Hollywood wunderkinds. Boogie Nights was hailed by one critic as the first great film about the ‘70s to come out since the ’70s. Anderson was born in Studio City, California, on January 1, 1970. After a brief stint as an English major at Emerson College and an even shorter stint at the New York University Film School, Anderson began his career as a production assistant on various TV movies, videos, and game shows in Los Angeles and New York. In 1992, he made his short Cigarettes & Coffee, and after it was screened at the 1993 Sundance Festival, he made his first full-length feature, Sydney — retitled Hard Eight, which despite its ’A’ festival recognition went unnoticed by the audiences. Later on Anderson did Boogie Nights, which received three Oscar and two Golden Globe nominations,and was widely hailed as one of the best films of the year, if not the decade. His next film… read more
Parts of the film work excellently on a emotional level (though with no pretensions of realism). Others I'm not so sure about. Some of the relentless cutting in the first hour actually tired me. Thankfully it slowed down later.
(Taken from my blog at http://ryanestabrooks.com/Blog.html )
Magnolia is a film written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson… read review
After writing and directing a masterpiece as ‘Boogie Nights’ (1997) at only 27,the question was what’s next with PT Anderson?
Then you take basically the same cast,same city but nowadays and this… read review
While forceful, pretentious, and overly-ambitious, Magnolia still manages to be a gripping, all-encompassing examination of human suffering. The themes are so broad and plentiful that it’s laborious… read review
If I have one complaint about this film, it’s that I would have liked a bit more background on Hoffman’s character. But that’s one little thing in a film that I really can’t say enough good things… read review