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Jacob Mikanowski reviews Paul Thomas Anderson’s film ‘The Master’: The answer has something to do with Freddie’s deep unease, the way he seems at odds and out-of-joint with his surroundings and the times. With his painfully hunched shoulders and a battered, deeply-lined face, he looks like an evolutionary throwback, an australopithecine John Garfield dropped off on the savannahs of a new continent. As played by Joaquin Phoenix, Freddie has the demeanor of a wounded animal. Tight spaces make him uncomfortable. Time and again, Anderson frames him in enclosures — a chicken wire shack, a ship’s hold — that make him visibly unhinged. Behind bars in actual prison, Freddie is a complete maniac. When he speaks he keeps his lips pressed together, talking out of the corner of his mouth like a stroke victim. And the damage extends to what he says: he’s barely able to articulate a thought or access a memory. Though a creature of appetite, with a constant need for sex and drink, he doesn’t have much success with women. He’s a wizard with booze, however — a moonshine alchemist who can synthesize rotgut out of whatever happens to be at hand, whether it’s paint thinner or Lysol. Click here to read the rest of American Caliban.

Jacob Mikanowski reviews Paul Thomas Anderson’s film ‘The Master’:

The answer has something to do with Freddie’s deep unease, the way he seems at odds and out-of-joint with his surroundings and the times. With his painfully hunched shoulders and a battered, deeply-lined face, he looks like an evolutionary throwback, an australopithecine John Garfield dropped off on the savannahs of a new continent. As played by Joaquin Phoenix, Freddie has the demeanor of a wounded animal. Tight spaces make him uncomfortable. Time and again, Anderson frames him in enclosures — a chicken wire shack, a ship’s hold — that make him visibly unhinged. Behind bars in actual prison, Freddie is a complete maniac. When he speaks he keeps his lips pressed together, talking out of the corner of his mouth like a stroke victim. And the damage extends to what he says: he’s barely able to articulate a thought or access a memory. Though a creature of appetite, with a constant need for sex and drink, he doesn’t have much success with women. He’s a wizard with booze, however — a moonshine alchemist who can synthesize rotgut out of whatever happens to be at hand, whether it’s paint thinner or Lysol.

Click here to read the rest of American Caliban.

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