Paul Thomas Anderson
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Paul Thomas Anderson (born June 26, 1970[paul thomas anderson ::], Cigarettes and red vines. accessed April 24, 2006. in Studio City, California) is an American filmmaker.
Film style and trademarks
Anderson is perhaps best known for his movies with large ensemble casts and complex, interweaving storylines, namely Boogie Nights (1997) and Magnolia (1999). He is part of the first generation of "VCR filmmakers"; directors such as Quentin Tarantino, who learned their craft not in film schools, but by viewing thousands of movies on video in their adolescence and thus gaining a vast knowledge of film technique and culture.The films of Paul Thomas Anderson typically deal with the significance of familial relationships over time, especially with regard to fathers and their children. Themes concerning divine fate, the serendipitous nature of love, and the role of media in contemporary life are also common. The director stresses the interconnections between his characters as these forces unpredictably, and even chaotically, weave in and out of their fragile lives. Anderson's stylistic trademarks include the frequent use of logistically difficult steadicam-based long takes, such as the opening shot in Boogie Nights (which lasts approximately 3 minutes without a cut), and an aggressively bombastic use of sound and music.
There was a feud between fans of Magnolia and Kevin Smith found at Kevin Smith's web forum www.viewaskew.com. PTA had no part of this feud. Magnolia fans went after Kevin Smith after Smith declared his hatred for Magnolia. It caused Kevin to put a reference to it in his movie Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back with the "magnoliafan" Internet fanboy reference. Some thought this tension would spill over to Smith and Anderson, but the two later met in a doctor's office where Anderson introduced himself to Kevin and there was no ill-will. The two later meet each other on the set of Saturday Night Live when Ben Affleck was hosting. In that episode Anderson directed the sequence of Affleck meeting Anna Nicole Smith.
Anderson has also directed several music videos including several Fiona Apple videos.
Philip Seymour Hoffman has appeared in all four of Anderson's features. Other actors with multiple appearances in Anderson films include Philip Baker Hall, John C. Reilly, Luis Guzmán, Ricky Jay, Julianne Moore, William H. Macy, Melora Walters and Robert Ridgely. His three big-budget films (after Hard Eight) were headlined by Mark Wahlberg, Tom Cruise and Adam Sandler, respectively.
Anderson's next film, There Will Be Blood, is an adaptation of the Upton Sinclair novel Oil!. The novel is set during the oil scandals of the Harding administration, providing in the process a detailed picture of the development of the oil industry in Southern California and will star Daniel Day-Lewis.
Personal life
A New York University dropout, Anderson is the son of voice actor Ernie Anderson, best remembered as the voice of the American Broadcasting Company and as Cleveland-area horror host Ghoulardi, after whom Paul's production company, Ghoulardi Films, is named.
Paul and Saturday Night Live cast member Maya Rudolph are in a relationship and have a daughter, Pearl Bailey Anderson, born on October 15, 2005 (see [link]).
In the past, he has also been romantically linked to singer Fiona Apple, who appears with him in the making-of video diary on the DVD of the film Magnolia.
Filmography (as writer and director)
- Hard Eight (also known as Sydney) (1996)
- Boogie Nights (1997)
- Magnolia (1999)
- Punch-Drunk Love (2002)
- There Will Be Blood (in production- 2006)
External links
- [cigarettes and red vines - the p.t. anderson web resource]
- [Punch Drunk Love: The Budding of an Auteur by Cubie King]
- ["The 'Quirky' New Wave".] Alternate Takes
References
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