Cinema
Magnolia
Paul Thomas Anderson · 1999
Synopsis
A single day in Los Angeles. Earl Partridge, a dying television producer, asks his nurse Phil to find Frank, the son he abandoned, who has become a leader of seduction seminars for men; Linda, his young wife, married him for the money and has come to love him. Jimmy Gator, host of a children's quiz show, himself ill, tries to reconnect with his daughter Claudia. Stanley, the show's child prodigy, is pushed by his father, and Donnie, a former champion of the same programme, has just been fired. A policeman, Jim, calls at Claudia's home over a noise complaint.
Context
The film came two years after the success that won the director control of the final cut from his studio; the result was a narrative of more than three hours, which several critics describe as nine stories. Tom Cruise, who had invited Anderson onto the set of another film, asked him to write him a role. Anderson's production company bears the name of the character played by his father, and the producer JoAnne Sellar has accompanied him from film to film.
Who it is for
A three-hour ensemble film with many characters whose stories gradually intersect.
Prizes and reception
Golden Bear in Berlin in 2000 and three Oscar nominations, for a budget of thirty-seven million dollars and forty-eight million in worldwide box office.
Sources for this page 7
The pages consulted to check this page.