“Some people are called to be a good sailor. Some people have a calling to be a good tiller of the land. Some people are called to be a good friend. You have to be the best at whatever you are called at. Whatever you do, you ought to be the best at it – highly skilled. It’s about confidence, not arrogance. You have to know that you’re the best whether anybody else tells you that or not. And that you’ll be around, in one way or another, longer than anybody else. Somewhere inside of you, you have to believe that.”

Paul Thomas Anderson is kind of like the Daniel Day-Lewis of directors: So brilliant, yet so stunningly infrequent. Perhaps this is the mark of genius. Perhaps it is the cost of laboring outside the Hollywood mainstream. Either way, this much is clear: Both Anderson and Lewis very rarely miss the mark when it comes to applying their trade.

All of which brings us to The Master – Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest film, co-anchored by big-screen heavyweights Philip Seymour-Hoffman and Joaquin Phoenix. Phoenix is the role transcendent, so completely immersed in the skin of Freddie Quell that you very often feel as if you’re trapped deep down inside that reckless monster alongside him.

Hoffman’s Lancaster Dodd, on the other hand, somehow manages to bulldoze right over Freddie Quell, time and time and time again … which is – of course – exactly how the thing was designed. There are entire scenes in this film where the audience feels as if it’s being treated to a master class in on-screen method and timing. On that score, The Master is an astounding piece of cinema, superbly paced and played from the first frame to the last.

The ongoing problem, however, is that The Master tends to drag … veering off into what equates to a running joke about putting a blind fool in a round room and forcing him to find the corner. Round and round the screenplay goes, Freddie Quell forever rushing to keep up, while the master keeps him guessing from the center.

In the end, it’s the extremely high level of acting and directing that keeps the lagging screenplay from toiling in obscurity. And yet, that venerable combination alone is more than worth the price of admission. So I say, “Why not see The Master … for that combination, and that combination alone?”

All the rest is clouds and darkness, and clouds and darkness ain’t no fun.

(The Master opens in limited release today, with a national rollout to follow.)

Arbitrage is one of the top 10 movies of the year … and that certainly is saying something, considering we’re just now easing into Oscar season and The Master hasn’t even hit theaters yet.

Despite that, I’ll say it again: Arbitrage is one of the top 10 movies of the year, anchored by an ageless Richard Gere, who delivers what is undoubtedly one of the best performances of his career. Brit Marling is equally impressive as the moral conscience of the film, and Tim Roth rounds out the main ensemble as a swarmy-yet-effective NYPD detective who’ll do just about anything to get his man.

Arbitrage is strongly hinged upon the age-old premise that money was, is, and always will be the primary root of all evil. What separates this film from a rash of similar fare is just how deviantly well-crafted Nicholas Jarecki’s modern screenplay really is.

Whereas the majority of post-downturn dramas focus squarely on the billion-dollar devil in dark shoes, Arbritage takes the metaphor a step further, boldly suggesting we’re all somehow complicit in the same high-stakes con game … every major (and minor) player quite literally angling to stuff his or her hand in the next person’s pocket.

The prevailing takeaway: Rote capitalism is what really makes this world go round.

The most fascinating aspect: Just how stunningly difficult Arbitrage makes it to dispute Jarecki’s logic.  

(Arbitrage arrives in theaters nationwide this coming Friday.)

“But here’s the thing on comedy. If I were to do a satire on the assassination of John Foster Dulles, it would shock people. They’d say, “That is in heinous taste.” Why? Because it’s fresh. And that’s what my contention is: That satire is tragedy plus time. You give it enough time, the public, the reviewers, will allow you to satirize it, which is rather ridiculous, when you think about it. And I know, probably 500 years from today, someone will do a satire on Adolf Hitler, maybe even showing him as a hero, and everyone will laugh. There’ll be good fellowship. Hitler’ll be just a figure. And yet if you did it today, it would be bad. Yet today I could satirize Napoleon Bonaparte, because, y’know, he’s gone.”

(Good Pictures/Bad Camera is a regular feature on IFB.) 

(Good Pictures/Bad Camera is a regular feature on IFB.)  

“The only advice I can think of is that it’s only the work that counts. Don’t read about yourself. Don’t have big discussions about your work. Just keep your nose to the grindstone. And don’t think about any of the perks. Don’t think about the money or laudatory things. The less you can think about yourself, the better. It’s like being a baseball pitcher; the less you’re conscious of your motion the better you pitch. Just do good work, don’t waste time thinking about anything else, don’t join the show business circus, don’t pay attention to the distractions that people send your way, and everything else will fall into place. If people don’t like your work, keep doing your own thing and either they’ll wise up or you’ll find yourself out of work and deserving to be. If people hate your work, let them – they may be right. Or not. And if people even call you a genius, it’s very important to run because you have to ask, if you’re a genius, then what is Shakespeare or Mozart or Einstein? With me it’s always modified downward – ‘a comedy genius.’ I’d say a comedy genius is to a real genius what the president of the Moose Lodge is to the President of the United States.” 

(Good Pictures/Bad Camera is a regular feature on IFB.)

How funny you are today New York
like Ginger Rogers in Swingtime
and St. Bridget’s steeple leaning a little to the left

here I have just jumped out of a bed full of V-days
(I got tired of D-days) and blue you there still
accepts me foolish and free
all I want is a room up there
and you in it
and even the traffic halt so thick is a way
for people to rub up against each other
and when their surgical appliances lock
they stay together
for the rest of the day (what a day)
I go by to check a slide and I say
that painting’s not so blue

where’s Lana Turner
she’s out eating
and Garbo’s backstage at the Met
everyone’s taking their coat off
so they can show a rib-cage to the rib-watchers
and the park’s full of dancers with their tights and shoes
in little bags
who are often mistaken for worker-outers at the West Side Y
why not
the Pittsburgh Pirates shout because they won
and in a sense we’re all winning
we’re alive

the apartment was vacated by a gay couple
who moved to the country for fun
they moved a day too soon
even the stabbings are helping the population explosion
though in the wrong country
and all those liars have left the UN
the Seagram Building’s no longer rivalled in interest
not that we need liquor (we just like it)

and the little box is out on the sidewalk
next to the delicatessen
so the old man can sit on it and drink beer
and get knocked off it by his wife later in the day
while the sun is still shining

oh god it’s wonderful
to get out of bed
and drink too much coffee
and smoke too many cigarettes
and love you so much