Magnolia (film)

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Movie
German title Magnolia
Original title Magnolia
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1999
length 188 minutes
Age rating FSK 12
JMK 16
Rod
Director Paul Thomas Anderson
script Paul Thomas Anderson
production Joanne Sellar,
Paul Thomas Anderson
music Jon Brion ,
Aimee Man
camera Robert Elswit
cut Dylan Tichenor
occupation

Magnolia is a 1999 feature film by US director Paul Thomas Anderson .

He tells the stories of several people in one day in the San Fernando Valley ( California ) in different episodes . The connections between the individual people only emerge in the course of the film. Anderson was inspired by songs by Aimee Mann , who also contributed songs to the soundtrack , when writing the script .

Preliminary remark

The film connects the stories of nine people living in Los Angeles. The “ past ” and “ coincidence ” play a decisive role in the film, which is illustrated in the opening credits with three small episodes. The narrator says at the beginning of the film: “No, this wasn't just a coincidence. Such strange things happen all the time. ”And at the end:“ We have finished with the past, but the past has not with us ”. In addition, the title song of the film says (quote): "Save me from the ranks of freaks who think they can never love anyone except [those] freaks who think they can never love anyone" . The plot of the film is based on this.

action

Claudia Wilson Gator lives a self-destructive cocaine and sex addiction. The father she hated, TV veteran Jimmy Gator, who has cancer, hosts the quiz show "What Do Kids Know?" in which a team of children competes against one of adults. The current star of the TV show is boy Stanley, whom his father ruthlessly uses as a source of income. If Stanley, the smartest and hardest-working of the three team kids, beats the adult team twice more, then he'll break the record and be the kid who has stayed on the show the longest. The previous record has been held by Donnie Smith for 31 years. As an adult, the rather unsuccessful Smith wants to wear braces so that he can feel closer to his favorite bartender (who also wears braces). He can't afford to have his teeth straightened unnecessarily, especially not when his employers, two brothers who own a TV shop, fire him without notice.

Television patriarch Earl Partridge, whose company produces the television show, is dying at home, with terminal lung cancer. His much younger second wife, Linda, is plagued with guilt because of her initial lack of love and infidelity. Nurse Phil Parma tries to grant Earl's wish to see his son one last time so that he can make up with him. Earl had simply abandoned his seriously ill first wife and teenage son.

The lonely, devout policeman Jim Kurring, who regularly asks God for a wife, falls in love with Claudia when he is sent to her apartment because of noise pollution. Despite her criminal addiction, the latter responds to his interest.

Stanley pees his pants during the live TV show for not taking his urge to go to the bathroom seriously. As a result, he refuses to stand up for a duel question, and Claudia's father, Jimmy, collapses in front of the camera. The show ends without either team winning. Stanley's father confronts his son.

With death in mind, Jimmy tells his wife at home that Claudia's hostility toward him is because she thinks he sexually abused her as a child; but he could not remember anything. Then his wife leaves him.

The ex-child star Donnie sees no other way out of his financial predicament than to steal money from the company safe of his former job. When he drives away from the company premises with his loot, he feels remorse and turns back to bring back the black money.

Linda can't stand watching Earl die painfully, and she flees to another part of town in her car. She swallows the heavy morphine for the terminally ill Earl, which she got from various doctors, and passes out in the car. A little boy steals from her, but also calls the ambulance.

Jim Kurring is shot from ambush before his first date with Claudia, and he panics and loses his service weapon. He's late for the date. Claudia took cocaine out of nervousness. The police officer does not notice this, however, because he is internally preoccupied with his own professional failure.

The nurse Phil managed with great dedication to establish contact with Earl's son Frank, who initially denies his father. Frank works as a successful motivator and trainer for frustrated men, whom he teaches misogynist rogue techniques. With the help of television and the telephone hotline, he has built an empire ( dating coach Ross Jeffries (* 1958) is considered a real role model ). Phil sends his replacement away and tearfully gives Earl a strong dose of morphine drops that reduce his suffering but also affect his consciousness. At night Frank comes to the bed of his dying father Earl with a great inner struggle.

The frog rain

After several fade-ins about the weather and the humidity in the course of the film, in the end it suddenly rains thousands and thousands of large frogs . The ambulance with Linda skids on the frog-covered street and tips over on its side. As Jimmy Gator hesitantly begins to shoot himself, a frog falls through the skylight onto his hand, so that the detaching shot misses him. His wife is now looking for her daughter Claudia and takes her in her arms while the frogs patter on the roof above them. Stanley has hidden in the school library and watches the falling frogs in amazement. Donnie is hit by a frog while trying to get back into the TV shop via a rain gutter, falls to the ground, injures himself and is pulled under the roof of a gas station by Jim driving past. Frank reproaches Earl most violently at his bedside; But Earl, stunned by the morphine, dies without uttering an intelligible word.

In the aftermath of the rain: When Jim struggles with himself whether it would have been his job to arrest Donnie, his lost service weapon falls from the sky. Then Jim helps Donnie get the money back into the safe. Stanley takes all his courage and asks his father to be nicer to him in the future. Frank visits his injured stepmother Linda in the hospital. At the end of the film, Jim visits Claudia, who is smiling for the first time in a long time. Stanley's words echoed for a long time: “It all really happens. It all really happens. "

Details

The rain of the frogs is already hinted at during the film via the biblical passage from the second book of Moses, Exodus 8: 2. This can be seen in the game show, where a man briefly holds up a board that says EXODUS 8: 2 .

The quoted passage reads:

“Aaron stretched out his hand over the waters of Egypt. Then the frogs came up and covered all of Egypt. "

- Ex 8.2  EU

The numbers 8 and 2 can be seen several times in the film, for example, in the three episodes of the opening credits, a hanged man wears the number 82 on his chest, on a fire-fighting aircraft is the 82 and a rope forms an 82 next to a boy who is standing on the roof just before he jumps down. On the display board for the gala dinner of the forensic medics, the start is set at 8:20 pm. A lettering in the film sets the rain probability at 82%. While Donnie talks about his past in a bar, the numbers 8 and 2 can be seen next to each other on a blackboard. In the casino, Craig needs a 2 for a good hand, but gets an 8. Donnie Smith's win on the game show is dated April 28, 1968 (9 minus 1 and 8 minus 6). You can also see the inscription "Exodus 8.2" on the billboards at the bus stops. Last but not least, director Anderson mentioned on a US talk show that the film title was no coincidence either, as the word "Magnolia" had eight letters.

The film title also has other references to the film and the numbers 8 and 2 themselves, which Paul Thomas Anderson lists in the credits:

- One of the streets the film is set on is Magnolia Blvd. in the San Fernando Valley

- “Magnolia” sounds similar to the term “Magonia” mentioned in the credits, coined by Charles Fort and Jacques Vallée , for a place in heaven where things remain until they fall back to earth

Film music

The soundtrack , which was largely contributed by Aimee Mann , is exceptionally important, also as a cinematic stylistic device. In some scenes, the music was played so loudly on purpose that the characters' conversation becomes incomprehensible and the meaning of what is being said takes a back seat.

In a sequence of scenes, the plot is even temporarily suspended and the characters themselves become the medium of music, singing the same song at the same time, but not together, but each in his own scene. Only Phil and Earl sing in the same scene, Earl in his sick bed and Phil sitting next to it; but they too each sing for themselves, not looking at each other. After the song has ended, the interrupted film story continues.

Reviews

The film received mostly positive reviews. The film review portal Rotten Tomatoes gives 83% positive reviews for the film and it has a Metascore of 77 out of 100 on Metacritic .

“An episodically structured film that unfolds a wealth of stories that focus on the question of the guilt of fathers and the power of forgiving their children. The virtuously staged and impressively played drama contains the hope that compulsive psychological imprints can be overcome. A multi-layered, always surprising film of great intensity that permanently questions modern constructions of reality. "

- Lexicon of international film

“ Magnolia (…) is a film for which you develop a vague sympathy for three hours and afterwards don't know exactly why. When you put it in relation to other LA films, the sympathy is mixed with the doubts. Something is missing. Anderson is not even 30 and he talks like an old man - but maybe he just belongs to a generation that step out of all the long loops of irony and reflection in a completely impartial way. "

- Peter Körte : Süddeutsche Zeitung of February 16, 2000

“'Magnolia' is full of stories, main lines and side lines that become main lines, stories and history, culture and mentality, material, a lot of material. I've seen the film three times in a very short space of time, and each time I've discovered new sides, aspects, feelings, catastrophes, possibilities. 'Magnolia' is the kind of film that won't let me go, and that's a good thing, the best a film can do. "

- Ulrich Behrens : Filmstarts.de

Awards

  • Golden Globe 2000 :
    Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor : Tom Cruise
    nominated for best movie song : Aimee Mann for "Save Me"
  • Chlotrudis Awards 2000:
    Best movie
    Best Supporting Actor: Philip Seymour Hoffman
    nominated for best camera
    nominated for Best Director

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ "Come on and save me (...) from the ranks of the freaks, who suspect they could never love anyone. Except the freaks, who suspect they could never love anyone, but the freaks, who suspect they could never love anyone . "
  2. ↑ The Pick Up Artists - On the hunt with seduction artists. In: deutschlandfunk.de. P. 3 , accessed January 14, 2015 .
  3. ↑ Magnolia at Rotten Tomatoes (English)
  4. ↑ Magnolia at Metacritic (English)
  5. ↑ Magnolia. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed October 6, 2016 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used