'Phantom Thread' A Review

Phantom Thread is a period drama written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. The film stars Daniel Day Lewis as Reynolds Woodcock an obsessive controlling fashion designer in 1950's London. The film opens on a breakfast where Woodcock's latest young muse and romantic partner has outlived her usefulness, Woodcock's sister Cyril(Lesley Manville) offers to get rid of her which he accepts then drives out to the country. There he meets immigrant waitress Alma(Vicky Krieps) who he begins to develop a similar(muse/romance) relationship with. Except this time she's not a complete push over.

The actors themselves are all exceptional but they are hamstrung by the pedantic, predictable, boring characters they play and the tired, obvious, early 90's Oscar bait story they find themselves in. If this is Lewis's last performance, as he claims it is, it would be a startling ellipses on a career that has been here-to-fore definitive. Manville is the only one who actually achieves interest but she is given to little screen time. Krieps is good and her and Lewis have chemistry but ultimately their characters and story are too thin, too petty, too pedestrian to actually engage. There are a couple scenes which spark, where the actors are allowed to really sink their teeth in and go for it but they are few and only bring the rest of the film into unappealing leaden contrast.

The cinematography is gorgeous and evoking but so what? I'd just as soon go to a museum because the element that works in the film is solely visual.

The controlling and obsessive machinations of a rich asshole are not interesting. Further, the film is full of images showing women being subservient, under the control of, explicitly acting out the will of a man or men i.e. "stand here" "wear this" "walk this way". The first shot is of 15 silent working-class women marching into Woodcock's mansion to sew as he lounges in his bathrobe. It's boring, unnecessary, and quite frankly offensive. The third act attempts to make the Alma character Woodcock's equal by an improbable and ludicrous plot device, the message seemingly being "they're both monsters and they found each other, this is a romance!" Excuses of time period authenticity are tired and at this point worthless. The male genius/female muse trope is exhausted and meaningless.

A bizarre throwback to justly forgotten frivolous awards fodder like 93's The Remains Of The Day.  Writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson was either too self-involved or to isolated by wealth and success to realize Phantom Thread is exceptionally and unsettlingly out of touch.

Don't See It.