Review 437: Phantom Thread

Phantom Thread looks great, but narratively it's unbelievably shallow resulting in less success than the previous Day-Lewis/PTA collaboration.

In 1954 London, Reynolds Woodcock (Daniel Day-Lewis) is a renowned fashion designer who creates dresses for members of high society and lives with his sister Cyril Woodcock (Lesley Manville) who also manages his day-to-day operations. His charisma and genius is only matched by his obsessive, controlling personality.
Eventually Woodcock falls in love with a young waitress Alma Elson (Vicky Krieps) which leads to her becoming his assistant and muse. Over time the couple's relationship vacillates between affection and distance as they struggle to live with each other's differences.

The plot is astonishingly self-indulgent & painfully slow, especially for a Paul Thomas Anderson film. A pretentious exercise in style over substance with no morals, no lessons, no anything.
Just a good looking film featuring unlikeable people who do unlikeable things to each other
I just left the screening indifferent to what I saw. The story is unrewarding - there's no payoff whatsoever.

With a running time of 130 minutes, this film is quite a slog as well as a real chore to sit through.

Artistically, the film looks fantastically splendid, the production design (recreating London in 1954) is marvellous all the way down to the last painstaking detail. The costumes are majestic, the cinematography is gorgeous, the make up is rich and beautifully detailed, the score by Johnny Greenwood is appropriately lush and that’s about it.

Daniel Day-Lewis in his final role before retirement gives  In a sporadic but distinguished career where he's given one excellent performance after the next and bought to life such beautifully crafted, multilayered characters. An apparently OCD, obsessive, rigid, uncompromising tailor honestly doesn't put his talents as an actor to good use in my book. Day-Lewis (and I quote) mostly just acts like a-hole for the duration of this 130-minute picture. There's not a single redeeming quality to his personality. No progression of arc to his stubborn behaviour at all. The only fascinating thing about him is how fascinatingly rude he is/comes across.

Newcomer Vicky Krieps does fine with the material she's given...   I guess, much like Woodcock, there's nothing likeable or interesting about her and because of this we as an audiences are unsure of wether to be rooting for or against her. A character who willingly submits herself to verbal and behavioural abuse on a regular basis. A character, moreover, who allows herself to be punished just to be in a relationship with this man. What do these two characters see in each other? What do they have in common? What do these two people see in each other that draws them together? None of these questions are asked and we never find out.

Similarly Lesley Manville does fine with what she’s given playing Woodcock’s territorial sister whose relationship with Day-Lewis’ Reynolds Woodcock is treated as more of a footnote that an actual driving force.

Phantom Threat is detrimental exercise in style over substance, 2/5.

The Anonymous Critic.