PHANTOM THREAD

Short bursts of enthusiasm on Facebook aren't enough, I fear, for most people. I've seen "Phantom Thread" twice now within a few weeks and I stand by my claim that it's a masterpiece. Why? Well, it's a Paul Thomas Anderson film but that, in itself, means nothing. Despite my reverance for Anderson, (let's just say "Boogie Nights", "Magnolia" and "The Master"), even the greatest of film-makers can fall flat, (Hitchcock on a couple of occasions, Antonioni with "The Red Desert"), but this extraordinary film seems to me to be perfection. Indeed, there wasn't a frame that didn't excite me, a line of dialogue that didn't thrill me, a performance less than brilliant, (and I am speaking of the smallest of parts as well as of the three principles). Five minutes in and I knew I was watching something really special.

It's a love story, though one soaked in perversity. I don't want to give too much away to those of you who have yet to see it and to say more would be to say too much, but it's a love story nevertheless. It's also a beautifully understated study in sadomasochism though who is the sadist and who is the masochist is a matter of debate; for now let's just call it a psychological comedy-thriller with an equal emphasis on the comedy as on the thrills. Anderson's genius is to create two characters in whom we utterly believe and yet who, by their very eccentricities, remain two of the most strikingly original characters in recent cinema and, of course, he has got stunning performances from both Daniel Day-Lewis and Vicky Krieps as the lovers in question, (and an equally stunning performance from Lesley Manville as the dragon sister whose bark, it would appear, is worse than her bite). Yet even that wouldn't qualify "Phantom Thread" for masterpiece status. So what does?

Reynolds Woodcock, the character played by Day-Lewis, is a master couturier, fastidious to the point of suffering from OCD and Anderson surrounds him, and fills his film, with a myriad of telling details, details that as much as the fastidious Day-Lewis' fastidious acting allows us to get into Reynold's head, (the same details work equally well for Krieps' character Alma). This is a man who sews little keepsakes into his garments, who carries his mother with him wherever he goes, (he's a classic 'Mommy's Boy'), while Alma's early stint around kitchens certainly comes in handy when she needs it too, so the design of the film, the cinematography are crucial to its success. So too is Jonny Greenwood's great score. Here is a film positively drowning in music, drowning in the kind of music that films of the fifties, the period in which it is set, might have drowned in. So I stand by my claim that this is a masterpiece and one I know will stand up to repeated viewings. If I see a better film this year it will have been a very good year indeed.