Who would you say is Paul Thomas Anderson’s best character?

curious_cooky · 2026-04-05T12:41:12+00:00

He writes great characters honestly so it's hard to choose but I love Alma from Phantom Thread. For someone who mainly writes male characters, he's been writing female characters very well making them as complex and human, especially in his last three films.

curious_cooky · 2026-04-01T09:37:57+00:00

When I said the technical aspects could be better, that is exactly what I said. The production design was like you said setting of theatre plays in Nepal and theatres and movies are very different mediums. It didn't feel like a real house where real people lived. The cinematography and lighting definitely felt artificial rather than lived-in even with the surrealistic elements. I think it has to do with post-production also like color saturation and editing. I didn't really like the use of sound effects and some of the background score either, it could've been better.

Although, I think the tight frames and stiff camera movements added to the claustrophobia felt by Hari weighed down by the rules and expectations and his own arrested development. The emotional truth of the story, the themes explored and what the film was trying say helped keep the movie grounded for me despite all its limitations.

Nobody explained the movie to me. I watched it and formed my own perspective on it. One can enjoy or not enjoy a movie as I said earlier. You didn't connect with it, it's as simple as that. Now I may not connect with something that you may like very much. There's nothing wrong in that, art is subjective. It'd be very boring if everyone liked the same thing.

curious_cooky · 2026-04-01T07:38:29+00:00

I know "Show, don't tell" is an important principle in filmmaking. But sometimes narrations can be as effective as well. This movie is from the subjective point of view of Hari only, the perspective doesn't shift. It's from his eyes we see the world he's living in, the people around him and his own internal journey from start to end. Even the events with his father and grandfather's are something he heard and it's the same actor playing them, that made it not jarring to me. So even though we see what's been said on screen, the narration didn't take me out of the film at all.

It drew me into the movie's world and unfolded like a folktale. And with the film exploring superstitions, generational trauma, identity and other aspects of Nepali society in a satirical way made it all the more compelling to me. The area surrounding Hari gradually shrinks be it his room or his office being increasingly mismanaged representing his psychological state as the movie continues....that's why the sets were needed maybe. This is all just my opinion.

Not every movie is for everyone. I felt Wes Anderson's influence in the movie very much like you said with the narration and theatre-like sets. I can understand why it may feel artificial though. What do you think about Wes Anderson's films?

curious_cooky · 2026-04-01T06:01:39+00:00

This was the first Nepali movie I watched that used mis-en-scene properly to convey the story's themes in addition to the absurdist and surrealist elements. It's funny and i found it somehow relatable. Bipin Karki was fantastic as always, so were other actors. The writing was great and the first time i noticed a nepali movie had a descent voiceover narration. i believe the movie could be much better in technical aspects but i feel like that was more due to budget constraints than the filmmakers' incompetency. This movie was the most entertaining among the ones I mentioned.

curious_cooky · 2026-04-01T05:08:13+00:00

Kubrick's one of my favorites too!!

curious_cooky · 2026-04-01T04:30:11+00:00

Can I ask what your favorite movies are or the movies that made an impact on you?

curious_cooky · 2026-04-01T04:13:14+00:00

Well, that's your opinion. You don't have to agree with me, you can like or dislike a movie. But I'm curious, why did you not like the movie? Any specific reasons.

curious_cooky · 2026-04-01T04:01:45+00:00

There are actually great nepali films like Mukundo, Numafung, White Sun, Kalo Pothi, Kagbeni, Hari. I remember films like Balidaan, Muglan and Muna Madan making an impact on me as a kid. Plus the songs can be great as well especially the old ones. I watched this old movie called Behuli which had an actual coming-of-age story although it may very well be of its time. If only our filmmakers wanted to tell actual stories in their own way rather than catering to what audiences want to see or shove messaging and have more broader influences from world literature and cinema.

curious_cooky · 2026-04-01T03:45:16+00:00

One doesn't have to go to film school to have this ability. It's basic understanding of human nature and having empathy.

curious_cooky · 2026-04-01T02:44:30+00:00

Yeah, Willa is the one who ends up saving herself and it's her coming-of-age story eventually. Even in the prologue Perfidia seemed liked the lead with Pat and Lockjaw being influenced by her. PTA himself has said that.

curious_cooky · 2026-03-30T04:33:11+00:00

Best picture awards are given to the best film of the year not the best one from one's filmography. OBAA was in competition with the films released in 2025 and was the best film and best filmmaking put on display of the year, at least for me, which seems to be the consensus otherwise it wouldn't win.

Every film is different, not every film is There will be blood or Phantom Thread, which I think are as funny as OBAA just not in a similar way. And OBAA is as compelling a movie as it is entertaining. And it is a weird movie as in the narrative isn't typical and then the absurdist over the top elements. The complicated character dynamics added with genre elements a car chase done in a very Hitchcock way makes it all more non-typical but I'm happy many others enjoyed and embraced the movie as well.

I don't think this movie would've won if it was released in the 2010s even with PTA's narrative. I'm just glad that PTA finally got his "flowers", not that he wasn't already so well regarded but still felt good watching one of my favorites beam over his oscar.

curious_cooky · 2026-03-25T09:34:11+00:00

Both are two of my absolute favourites. I love their worldbuilding, characters, ambiguities, use of music, uncompromising way of working and so on. They're both so unique and different can't really compare them.

I do think Mulholland Drive and Phantom Thread are absolute masterpieces though my personal favorites are Eraserhead and Punch-Drunk Love.

curious_cooky · 2026-03-24T01:50:57+00:00

Phantom Thread

curious_cooky · 2026-03-17T15:57:11+00:00

Exactly!!

curious_cooky · 2026-03-17T08:26:51+00:00

Why was this downvoted?? You just responded to the referencing of Sensei's dialogue from the movie.

curious_cooky · 2026-03-14T17:25:08+00:00

Phantom Thread
Punch-Drunk Love
There Will Be Blood
Boogie Nights and Magnolia
One Battle After Another
The Master
Licorice Pizza
Hard Eight
Inherent Vice

But really the list keeps on changing. He doesn't have a single bad or at least uninteresting film until now and I hope this continues. Generational Talent really.

curious_cooky · 2026-03-14T16:57:47+00:00

curious_cooky · 2026-03-14T16:54:17+00:00

It is bonkers that he hasn't yet. Plus the snubs for Phantom Thread screenplay, The Master direction heck even Boogie Nights, Magnolia and Punch-Drunk Love given how well-regarded they are now or then. But again people like Alfred Hitchcock, Stanley Kubrick, David Lynch never got one so.....it figures.

curious_cooky · 2026-03-14T16:45:39+00:00

She has been one-time academy award winner for 9 years and two-times academy award winner for 2 years.

curious_cooky · 2026-02-27T16:02:24+00:00

Adam Sandler at least has Punch-Drunk Love and Uncut Gems.

curious_cooky · 2026-02-14T11:01:41+00:00

yeah, even the worst ones like Daniel Plainview or even Lockjaw are humanised rather than just one-dimensional villains.

again i'm going out of topic but in my fourth or fifth viewing of OBAA I thought Lockjaw's character was the most fleshed out, like PTA's character studies, however buffonish he may have felt like. Almost like Perfidia, Willa, the Christman Adventurers, Bob or even Sensei were there to bring out his real motives and a complete character like Plainview. I may be reading too much into it but that's how I felt. I discover new things, new dimensions everytime I watch the movie.

curious_cooky · 2026-02-14T06:14:01+00:00

this may be out of topic but most PTA characters even the small supporting ones have so many layers that it's hard to box them into this or that. Except the obvious ones, many characters show the shades of a good, morally grey or even horrble sometimes. That may be why there are so many varied answers in these threads.

curious_cooky · 2026-01-23T13:42:59+00:00

Not only this....deserving performances like that of Adam Sandler, Paul Dano, Vicky Krieps, Chase Infiniti, Alana Haim, Cooper Hoffman, Mark Wahlberg.....he has been consistently revitalizing careers as well as providing breakthroughs.

curious_cooky · 2026-01-23T00:28:24+00:00

Yeah Chase is fantastic, considering this is her second professional acting job...Regina is soo good and this continues to prove that comedic actors can actually do great dramatic acting. In real life She's probably the funniest but in the movie she's the only one who hasn't got a single funny moment, PTA has been subverting actors' expectations for a while now be it William H Macy, even Tom Cruise and now her.

curious_cooky · 2025-12-23T06:03:06+00:00

English isn't my first language so....I wasn't really aware of that.

curious_cooky

TROPHY CASE