The Master Reviews

THE MASTER is challenging, perplexing, at times infuriating - and always thoughtful. Indelible. And always, always beautiful.

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by itself, gives lie to the idea that Americans don't make great, nuanced, complicated films. It's sublime.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/4

Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master is a challenging film, like most of his work. One that evokes a spellbinding performance out of Joaquin Phoenix.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5

Despite sumptuous cinematography and sublime acting, Paul Thomas Anderson's latest film ultimately feels a touch pointless.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5

There is not too much by way of extras in the new Blu-ray release of the under appreciated film, "The Master," but what is there is excellent.

Full Review | Original Score: A-

Admirável ao permitir que o filme desenvolva seus temas e personagens ao seguir em direções frequentemente inesperadas, Anderson continua a demonstrar seu talento como cineasta tanto pela maturidade de seus temas quanto por seu preciosismo estético.

Full Review | Original Score: 5/5

Refusing to wrestle with the veracity or the real implications of The Cause, one begins to question what is underpinning the entire exercise, an ambiguity that, as with Kubrick, will require multiple viewings to unravel.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5

In the end it may not have the emotional uplift the Academy or a popular mainstream audience craves, but make no mistake, this is an enthralling drama about a peculiarly American restlessness, and the striving for insight and grace.

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The at-times-impenetrable film will require multiple viewings to fully appreciate the multitude of themes and subtext.

Full Review | Original Score: A

[A] challenging, psychologically fraught drama.

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Anderson has achieved his mid-century epic, and in its pure 65mm sumptuousness, the great American movie.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/4

THE MASTER is a brilliant film. THE MASTER is a confounding film. The Master is a terrible film. THE MASTER may talked about for the ages or forgotten in a few years. THE MASTER may be a masterpiece, THE MASTER may be empty of content...

Full Review | Original Score: A-

THE MASTER is brilliant and/or confounding and/or terrible. It may be talked about for the ages or forgotten in a few years. It may be a masterpiece, and/or it may be empty of content masked by strong moments of acting prowess and visual flare.

Full Review | Original Score: A-

The least accessible of Anderson's films, and the least enjoyable, but it's intelligent and original enough for him to remain a "must-see" director.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5

For me, it is a masterpiece, a visually stunning explosion of pure cinema, emotionally charged with a penetrating psychological punch. If you are bored by this film, to paraphrase the great Samuel Johnson, then you are bored with life.

Full Review | Original Score: 9/10

The Master is not short but, once you fill in the blanks, you find yourself constructing a meta-film that, if realised, would play for many, many more hours.

Full Review | Original Score: 5/5

A dense, baffling, thoroughly original epic that seems to divide viewers on the simple question of what it's supposed to be about.

Full Review | Original Score: 5/5

Feral, hunched, his face like a clenched fist, Phoenix's Freddie is inarticulate and blocked where Hoffman's Dodd is extravagant, loquacious and smooth, although Dodd's sudden eruptions of anger suggests a possible kinship between them beneath the skin.

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Another challenging, impeccably crafted and purposefully uncomfortable effort which will delight arthouse buffs and bore mainstream viewers in equal measure, The Master isn't for everyone.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5

The Master is drags you through the dark flux of a destructive man's clash with a man hell bent on manipulating his universe. It's powerful cinema in every regard.

Full Review | Original Score: 4.5/5