family is not offended by her part as the "the obedient and oppressed lover" of Hoffman (the film's L Ron Hubbard).

http://www.hollywood.com/news/Amy_Adams_scared_to_offend_Mormon_family_in_The_Master/38159643

Sounds like she is playing a role in this film that might hit a little too close to home for mormons.

The parallels between Joseph Smith's personality and the creation of Mormonism and L. Ron Hubbard's personality and the creation of Scientology are striking.

Did you read the comment from Phillip? What the hell is he even talking about?

I responded to Phillip

"Obviously a boilerplate response generated to fit "most" unfavorable articles about Mormonism."

As I understand it, the church has actually written an number of responses and has volunteers just clicking on #2, #7, #5, etc.


Anagrammy

Or is the code more like a guideline?

sorry I had to...Capt. Jack Sparrow and all!! :)

That guy Phiilip says the BofA was written in code! OY VAY!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/24/2012 03:10PM by bignevermo.

anagrammy Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I responded to Phillip
>
> "Obviously a boilerplate response generated to fit
> "most" unfavorable articles about Mormonism."
>
> As I understand it, the church has actually
> written an number of responses and has volunteers
> just clicking on #2, #7, #5, etc.
>
>
> Anagrammy


lol, thanks for the giggle.

I suspect there might be a good book that was cannibalized for this movie.

I'm going to try to find it.

Regarding the Master's wife. I have actually seen a similar dynamic at work in polygamy. The first wife sits slightly behind and to the side of the leader and cues him, whispering occasionally to an assistant, nodding at the leader or very slightly shaking her head. She controls who he gets to marry by withholding her consent and she has the respect of the other wives.

I see a similar dynamic in matriarchal societies where the wife gets the respect and the mistresses "have" to do the nasty stuff like providing oral. That's how it is seen in Spanish society. It is one of the reasons Spanish women are perfectly fine being fat. Their husbands have mistresses and they are secure in being the legitimate wife.

The wife legitimizes the priesthood holder. He will never be advanced without her and he can only have one for the spotlight. She becomes a trusted advisor and is the only one, usually, who really knows where the skeletons are buried.

In the last scene in the Master, it is she who decides Quill is beyond salvation. She washes her hands of him after he gives his usual ambivalent responses. Then she gets up and walks out, signifying that the decision has been made. She doesn't even look at her husband to see if he disagrees.

We in Mormonism have seen many just like her. I think of David O. McKay's wife, who no doubt selected his secretary to be the second wife. I think of Camilla Kimball, who marred Spencer's path and so they made up a completely phony biography of their lives together, never mentioning the years of separation. His "rule" demonstrated the lack of the steadying female hand in his intemperate proclamations regarding sex, which many feel revealed his anger towards her.

Anagrammy

I'm dying to see this. Even the trailer creeped me out. It will be like watching JS in action.

A horror movie for us who used to live in the haunted house!

Ana

Nice analogy, Ana. I spent my early years in that house. Holey socks, holy underwear, Holy Ghost!

I've heard it said that mormonism is scientology-lite.

I do know its one of the few, if not only, religion that's even more expensive than ChurchCo.

I'm going to this tomorrow night with a friend who was raised Southern Baptist (and is now an atheist). We can't wait!

Suddenly Giselle makes so much more sense to me. :)

It's not out on theatre where I live?

Road trip to Vegas, see the movie and then catch our meetup Sunday afternoon.

Do you also live in stg?

vegas

Just saw at The Sundance Kabuki in SF. Will not expand much to avoid spoiler and allow the weekend to pass for us eager beavers.

I will say I did not find it to be a quality job of storytelling and also am critical of the editing. If the director made a good movie, the editors left it on the floor.

I'll be interested to hear others and discuss details with Spoiler Alerts in a few days.

I also just saw this movie today.

It was not really what I expected - not that I really knew what to expect.

It was artsy, LONG, and slow moving but OK. The acting was good.

For me the story hit on how people with not a lot going on (if you know what I mean) are vulnerable.

I honestly don't think modern Mormons would see any resemblence to what they are doing and how the Master worked in the movie.

The funny thing to me was something that happened in the audience where I saw the movie. Shortly after the start of the movie there was a masturbation scene. Some older lady got up all in a huff and left. LOL. As if she would get what was going on in the movie.

I can't say I was thrilled with the movie because I didn't like the main character much (not the Master) and I didn't enjoy the setting - post war back in the 1950s.

I too would like to discuss spoilers with gentlestrength and anyone else who saw it. I'd love to hear what others think on this odd movie.

Dagny- did you see my thread "Review of The Master?"

You and I pretty much see eye to eye.

Anagrammy

Thanks, anagrammy! No, I didn't see your comments about it until now.

I totally agree with your comments.

The main character was such a loser type. I just didn't like the character much. I was almost glad he had his Master friend who gave him someplace to belong.

The main character reminds me of how I pictured the character Albert Camus' book, The Stranger (Meursault, an Algerian guy). He had no direction and no real opinion.

I guess I expected it to have more development with Philip Seymour Hoffman as the main character.

I wouldn't be surprised if they both get nominated for their acting in this though.

I was confused by the frontal nudity of the women. I couldn't tell if it was an imagination thing or if the women were just brainwashed to do that- kind of like how most religious leaders manage to get the women out of their clothes. :-)

I dunno. I just didn't get some of it. Why was the Master's life work buried in some desert? I had a lot of questions. It was a weird movie. I don't think I'm artsy fartsy enough for stuff like that!

Thanks for telling me your review was here. I had missed it.

The nude dancing scene was as it was viewed by the bored, drunk Quill. It was looking through the eyes of his aimless, bleak sexual preoccupation laced with hopelessness. It was ultimately impersonal and completely unsexual. The men were all dressed because Quill has no interest in the male nude body.

Had it been a "real" scene, the men would have been nude too. Cult men are the first ones naked so they can be serviced faster.

Personally I don't like movies that don't go anywhere. There was no character development--you didn't see him change. He was walking along the dock when he first saw the yacht where The Cause was partying and in the last scene, he was walking along a dock leaving England, unchanged.

There was nothing admirable about Quill and there were too many loose ends left untied. I wonder if the poster that mentioned the editing might have been right. Things happened that were never mentioned again, things foreshadowed and then not materializing, and wtf was that song the Master sang in the last scene? What did that have to do with anything?

Or was that the point?

Anagrammy

OK, what you say makes total sense.

Didn't someone sing to Quill earlier in the story? I couldn't figure out what the Master was singing about either.

I couldn't figure out why Master was in England or how he knew Quill was sitting in a movie theater watching Casper cartoons.

The only part I could relate to was that critic at that house who questioned Master's claims...and Quill went later to go punish him.

What was with the son who knew his dad was making crap up?

I didn't see why the Master would pick someone like Quill to be his right hand man.

How many fricking times did they need Quill to go back and forth between that wall and window?

So was Quill supposed to have mental issues from the war and/or from his mother in the asylum (inherited)?

I also think the poster who said it probably had editing issues was right. Parts dragged but parts seemed to be missing.

I really liked Hoffman in other movies like Capote. If they had made it more about him I think I would have liked it better.

I agree with you all about this movie. Could have done with some snappier pacing and an actual point or some sort of denoument or character epiphany or something.

I went to see it with my friend who studies mind control. What we did agree on is that it was an excellent study in how a charismatic cult leader will exploit one's insecurities and weaknesses (and Joaquin Phoenix's character was flawed) and present solutions to problems the victim didn't even know he had. Dissent was unwelcome -- remember when the dude at the party tried to call out Hoffman's character? Not allowed. We saw many of the hallmarks of a cult right there.

I would have liked to have seen more delving into the relationship between Amy Adams' character (I dearly love that actress) and Hoffman's. As it stands, I can't imagine how she appeared to be submissive and passive. I didn't see that at any point. What I saw was it appeared she was actually the one in charge -- she made her opinion firmly known behind closed doors and left Hoffman to execute it. She'd proclaim Quill wasn't worthy or not with the program or whatever, and he was just out. I thought she was the one controlling the puppet strings. Maybe that's the bit she thought might be too close to home for the mormons.

Sure, she was married to a guy with a huge, controlling, self-aggrandizing personality, and anyone would seem to be in the shadows of such a man, but I saw her as a power behind the curtain, especially toward the end. A lot of LDS wives are like that, pushing their husbands, using his position of authority to advance their own agendas. She could have been channeling Emma Smith.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/24/2012 12:27PM by Stray Mutt.

The hand-job scene really cemented that for me. You didn't actually see it, but she was standing sort of behind and beside him, giving him a reach around, while she whispered what she wanted and how he was going to act -- for her -- all the while she was, you know, whacking him off. The underlying message was, "I will service you and you will be very very pleased and get all the booty you could ever possibly dream of and you will absolutely toe the lines that I draw in the sand, you okay with that?"

And he was. ;>)

My friend saw that as the most frightening moment in the movie when she showed who was really in control with just a few flicks of her wrist. She literally had him in the palm of her hand and was in total control.

Paul Thomas Anderson makes long movies with a ridiculously long third (fourth, fifth?) act--remember the whole long stupid drug escapade sequence with Alfred Molina in 'Boogie Nights'?

Watch this video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GjE2UlrE76M&feature=context-shows&list=SL

because it is a VERY ACCURATE movie review of THE MASTER even though it was about a different movie. So here are the instructions:

Replace all Pirate References with "really pathetically weird robotic religious fanatics that are provided NO script support AT ALL"

AND replace KRAKEN with creepily naked people without any explanation or reason" and that really about sums it up.

So like the Ninja I can say, unequivocally, just save your $$.

A beautifully shot and well acted 10 minute short, that was edited to last 14 hours (or so it seemed). Didn't ANYONE associated with this pretentious piece of crap notice that there was no story here?

I didn't like the movie at all, but held off posting details. Just not good storytelling. I don't mind having characters I don't like, but there was no "there" in the story.