VALLEY BOY

The worlds of Paul Thomas Anderson.

- BY DAVID DENBY

Anderson plunges us into the physical realization of experience with a thoroughness that can be unsettling.

What is the sound of a needle entering fabric?

Something more significant, it seems, than the sound of one hand clapping. You hear a tiny pop followed by the rustle of violated muslin—a shudder in the silence of the universe. Scrupulous directors make sure that the sound of their movies is grossly efficient, so that the dramatic meaning of a scene is apparent even in the worst theatre or home system in the country. They also layer in, for those who care about such things, a secondary level of sound—think of the swishing skirts in Martin Scorsese's adaptation of Edith Wharton's “The Age of Innocence.” In “Phantom Thread” (2017)—the needle-and-fabric movie—the director, Paul Thomas Anderson, uses such details to build an exquisitely perceptible epic of minute events. The film is devoted to couture in mid-fifties London, a period of heavy, draped, self-conscious luxury. The style-setter in this milieu is Reynolds Woodcock (Daniel Day-Lewis), a designer of genius who is also an infantile narcissist. Reynolds must control every aspect of his life or fall into despair. At breakfast, his working-class mistress (Vicky Krieps) audibly butters her toast, and he acts as if the day has been lost to him. Excruciation is the movie's dominant emotional mode—not pain but nerves drawn to the breaking point. The struggle between the man and woman is fierce. Anderson surprises us: Reynolds's mistress, initially passive, employs stealth and guile and becomes her master’s master.