Now, you may say I’m criticizing the film simply because it’s different from those other films, doesn’t live up to what I want PTA to be. To that, I say, if this movie wasn’t by Anderson, I probably wouldn’t have written half as much. I want to understand how such a great director could misstep in this way. In some ways, it reminds me of Tim Burton’s Big Fish. That was a good, solid movie, but it lacked the personal spirit that infused his best work. People really responded to it, but I don’t know that anyone loved it in the way they loved Edward Scissorhands.

Who knows how things will go? Perhaps this will mark the ascent of Paul Thomas Anderson, beloved Oscar-winning epic filmmaker, or maybe it’s just a palette clearing exercise before he returns to more personal work. Ultimately, I can only say how I responded to the film, how I responded to the Day-Lewis performance and where the film succeeded and failed.