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Inherent Vice, Paul Thomas Anderson's rollicking adaptation of Thomas Pynchon's 2009 novel, exists in the wake of that wave. The beaches of '70s Los Angeles are populated with human flotsam. Hippies, Nazis, bikers, junkies, whores, Manson acolytes, dentists, cops, criminals and all manner of freaks commingle in the grimy tide pools. It's a magnificent film.
It's also not for all tastes, but hey, that's Anderson. This is the auteur who crafted the hyper-emotional human tapestry of Magnolia, the dark character studies of The Master and There Will Be Blood and the fantastical romance of Punch-Drunk Love. He's always defied genre.
Here, though, Anderson is working in one of the most time-worn genres of all: the detective story. Only with Inherent Vice, said private detective is less Sam Spade than Wavy Gravy, a pot-addled former doper named Doc Sportello (Joaquin Phoenix) whose ex, Shasta (Katherine Waterston), disappears before tipping him off about a plot to overthrow a powerful construction magnate. That takes Doc on a journey through the stony underworld of the '70s. All the while, he's feverishly dogged by police detective Christian "Bigfoot" Bjornsen (Josh Brolin) a flat-topped wannabe actor who takes great pleasure in stomping over hippies and brags about his myriad civil rights violations.
It takes very, very little time for Inherent Vice's core mystery to take a backseat to the lunatic characters that Doc—played with ethereal charisma by a never-better Phoenix—encounters. This might prove frustrating to some, as the film meanders from scene to scene with the giddy weirdness of a teenager with a head full of chronic. But Anderson is taking a cue from the convoluted plots of the classics: everything from The Maltese Falcon to The Long Goodbye and Chinatown. In Doc's world, dark alleys might lead to free dope or to violence, and since we're in his head for the entirety of the film—including a voice-over provided by a possibly imaginary narrator who gets distracted as Doc gets higher—it only makes sense that most ends are of the dead variety.
The key to enjoying Inherent Vice is to roll with the punches. Once you let go of the need for clarity and closure, you can appreciate a director working at the top of his game. Per usual, Anderson's film is carried by excellent character work. But what makes Inherent Vice his most thoroughly enjoyable film is the way these characters interact with one another, in ways seemingly unrelated to Doc's central quest. Brolin, as one of the most batshit hilarious personalities to emerge in years, manages to be at once touching, terrifying and ridiculous as the straight-laced yang to Doc's chemically enhanced yin. Other characters—Benicio Del Toro as Doc's lawyer, Reese Witherspoon as his sometimes-girlfriend, Owen Wilson as a Machiavellian saxophonist, and one SNL alum with a role too juicy to disclose—flit around Doc's periphery, some adding to the plot, others simply adding layers of chaos. It's a cacophony of stimulation that blurs the lines between reality and fantasy.
Not since Boogie Nights has Anderson had so much fun toying with taboos. Make no mistake, Inherent Vice is a surrealist comedy above all, a film that, like The Big Lebowski, reimagines the detective game through the bleary eyes of a counterculture hero of a bygone era. But Anderson approaches the mayhem with the same steady eye that's made him a juggernaut of the dramatic. And while some may find its strange, stream-of-consciousness approach to be grating, others will be enthralled with each and every gorgeously composed frame. This is a director riding high on a wave he himself created by cannonballing into the deep end. Let's hope it never crests.
Critic's Grade: A
SEE IT: Inherent Vice is rated R. It opens Friday at Cinema 21, Lloyd Center, Eastport, Clackamas, Cedar Hills, Bridgeport.
WWeek 2015