Tacticalin An absolute waste of money

SpunkySelfTwitter It’s an especially fun movie from a director and cast who are clearly having a good time allowing themselves to let loose.

Tyreece Hulme One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

Jemima It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

floydreese Magnolia is a fantastic ensemble film by wunderkind Paul Thomas Anderson. Featuring a host of actors- all somehow interconnected in the vast brawl of Los Angeles . Featuring a top notch cast and an inspiration directly lifted from Robert Altman's many movies (especially perhaps shortcuts) Magnolia is an art film masquerading as a mainstream feature courtesy Tom Cruise, Julianne Moore, William H Macy and a few others. This is a must watch for any cinema lover.

MJB784 Another movie where freedom to write and direct is endless is Magnolia. Here's the story of nine people who are all connected because of regrets in their past, they live in Magnolia and their sorrows lead to an extraordinary event which happens at the end of the day. The stories connect not just as a whole but in pairs: Two of the nine characters are dying of cancer, one produces and the other hosts the quiz show "What Do Kids Know?" and were bad fathers. Two women are on drugs. Two characters are quiz show kids, one currently on television, the other an unemployed wreck at thirty something. Plus, there's two caretakers, one for the dying man that produces the quiz show and a police officer helping one of the women on drugs, but doesn't know she's taking them. Plus the quiz kid on television is being embarrassed the same time as another character who has an interview and whose father, the producer dying of cancer, has left him. Oh and, the woman on drugs is the daughter of the quiz show host also dying. Plus, all nine characters sing a line from the song "Wise Up." Each line expresses what a certain character is going through. There are also paintings of the Magnolia flower throughout the picture. The surprise that brings the moral together through an act of god is also referenced throughout. Need I say more?

martinrking Magnolia is a very long and complex movie. It contains many themes and issues but it doesn't explore them with much depth. Magnolia ended without giving any new perspectives on its themes. It did leave me bored and impatient. It's impossible not to think when watching Magnolia, why not tackle half these themes, explore them more thoughtfully, say something, ask some questions, and do it in two hours? There are at least three movies contained in Magnolia. Some of the stories are captivating while others are one-dimensional and weightless. Julianne Moore threatens to sink the whole ship with her soap opera-level portrayal of a drug addict with almost-zero characterization. In stark contrast, the characters played by John C. Riley and Tom Cruise could have been entire movies unto themselves. Multiple characters are set up as "bad people" but then the "twist" is that they were abused as children. But as a movie about child abuse, Magnolia has nothing to say at all. Two characters confess that they cheated on their spouses in long monologues. But is Magnolia about infidelity? I don't think so. Is Magnolia about regret? Yes, it's about that, and guilt, parenting, child abuse, substance abuse, law enforcement and crime, honesty, dating, death and dying, child prodigies, show business, unlikely coincidences, loneliness, it never ends!Magnolia is very intense and melodramatic. I don't think intensity and melodrama are substitutes for pathos and insight. The meta-narrative about coincidences and interconnected lives is self-indulgent and self-congratulatory. Magnolia is only bearably watchable from beginning to end because of a few strong performances and excellent cinematography and editing.Ingmar Bergman apparently like this film. Well, if you want a movie about imperfect fathers, check out Bergman's Wild Strawberries. It's way better, and it doesn't have three music videos in it, and it's not over three hours long.

Shane Craig "The book says, "We may be through with the past, but the past is not through with us."Magnolia is a masterpiece. Paul Thomas Anderson is one of my favorite filmmakers and this film is definitely his best. When I finished school this year, I got home and realized there was only one PTA film I had not seen and that was Magnolia, so I popped it in. It was very late and I expected that I was going to get halfway, however I ended up watching all of it. When it ended, I sat there speechless. I called so many people telling them that I had just witnessed cinematic history and that it was the best dialogue driven film of all time. Over the last month, I have re-watched it about four times and shown it to several people. This film is too good not to see more than once. The way PTA blocks a scene, his realistic and well-written dialogue, and of course the performances. The performances are amazing as well. This ensemble cast knocks it out the park. The story revolves around a group of people in the San Fernando Valley, each of which have plot threads that tie into one another. This is one reason why the film's poster is sheer brilliance. It is a Magnolia flower and each petal has a character/characters. All of the petals go back to the middle of the flower. This is because while each of these stories are taking place at different times and sometimes different places...they all relate back to one another and are connected. This story is so well developed and it makes you care about each of these characters, whom you are with for over three hours. This film is very important in the way it depicts relationships. While some of these characters may not share any scenes together, their topics of story lines are certainly very similar. Stanley's story is almost identical to Donnie's. Stanley is a young boy who is clearly very intelligent and his father wants money, which he can win on Jimmy Gator's game show. This is exactly what happened to Donnie when he was on the show in the 60s and his parents took the money he won. These characters are developed in the way that any film character should. They are given depth, meaning, and flaws. Many of these characters are at their core good people, while some of them have questionable behavior. Take Claudia and Linda: two women who both use drugs excessively. In the beginning of the film, I clearly had a somewhat wrong impression of Claudia. When Jimmy arrived to tell her about his illness, she went ballistic and did not even acknowledge the situation. I was thinking that she was just some crazy junkie and she is disrespectful to her father. But once it was revealed that Jimmy had molested her, I totally felt for her and understood her previous actions. While you might dismiss Frank as a sexist pig in the beginning, you can certainly understand his pain later on when you see that his father abandoned him and his mother, who was also ill. In my opinion, the most kind character is Jim. He certainly means well and as an officer of the law he definitely cares about others' well-being. For example, at the end of the film Jim catches Donnie climbing up the side of the store he used to work at. He helps him out and lets him return the money he stole and even sets him up with a guy who works in oral surgery. Donnie Smith was in love and he thought getting braces would impress Brad the bartender. I think that that scene in the bar where a drunk Donnie gives a speech about love and admits his love for Brad is one of the best scenes of the whole film. William H. Macy delivers a great performance in that scene. While many may be confused with the frogs, it is actually brilliant. The frogs represent the plague in the book of exodus, as many of the characters and the narrator quoted the book throughout the film.What makes Magnolia so good and so unique is that it is about life. A lot of these situations are real-life situations that audiences can relate to. This is the best film of 1999 and of the decade.