Magnolia (1999)

“We may be through with the past, but the past is not through with us.” This simple idea frames Paul Thomas Anderson’s Magnolia, a story in which everything is connected: parents and children, colleagues and lovers, circumstance and proximity. Or maybe the pattern, if there is one, is that no pattern exists. Life happens. Trauma lingers. And sometimes frogs fall from the sky. Regardless of whether it’s about coincidence and fate, the film was made with unbridled creative freedom. Anderson’s unclassifiable 188-minute feature still divides viewers to this day. For some, it registers as the indulgence of a gifted but unchecked young auteur, intoxicated by his own ambition, who would go on to make far more controlled and inhibited films. For others, it stands as a life-affirming masterpiece, fueled by an outpouring of feelings. Indeed, to watch the film is to be caught in its emotional and cinematic gravitational pull. Its restless camera, onrushing music, heartbreaking monologues, and incomparable ensemble of marvelous performances generate a momentum that feels less plotted than propelled by raw emotion. What emerges is a work that insists on the messiness of human connection while conceding that, at times, the universe seems to have a grand design. And yet, in Magnolia, the questions of randomness or destiny prove secondary to the unfiltered humanity on display.

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