Paul Thomas Anderson, just 31 years old, is an extremely talented filmmaker. Boogie Nights was an unflinchingly honest yet comedic look at the porn world. Magnolia, while overstuffed, smoothly interwove multiple stories. Unfortunately, his latest work is a huge step backwards. Punch-Drunk Love is a catastrophe, a pretentious train wreck that becomes derailed early on and never approaches getting back on the tracks.
Barry Egan (Adam Sandler) is at a crossroads in his life. He's a miserable small-time employee with an office in a garage, a temper problem, and seven sisters who won't give him a moment of peace. One day, he finds a broken harmonium on the road outside his office. Moments later, a mysterious woman named Lena (Emily Watson) shows up, asking him to fix her car. Lena happens to be a co-worker of his sister Rhonda, who was already plotting to hook the two up. From this point, the film goes off into multiple tangents, including subplots about phone sex and pudding.
Now, I'm all for eccentricity. If a director can add spice to a stale subject and make it taste fresh, more power to him. However, PTA here has made a mistake. The flashes of brilliance that sparked Magnolia seem forced and out of place, and he has sacrificed all traces of reality. Consider - the head of the phone sex hotline (Phillip Seymour-Hoffman) hires three brothers to fly from Utah to California to beat Barry up, take the 500 dollars that they are "owed," and fly back. Now, the cost of this trip is clearly in excess of 500 dollars. So any effect that this scene might have had is immediately erased due to its utter lack of credibility. Similarly, Barry and Lena's relationship lacks chemistry and features some real dreck for dialogue. "You're so sexy, I want to eat your eyeball." Ugh.
Many have heaped effusive praise on Sandler's performance. My own analysis of his work is more cautious; he does a fine job but simply plays a toned down version of his normal goofball role. Watson, one of the finest actresses working today, is ridiculously underwritten as Lena, given nothing of substance to work with. Luis Guzman and Seymour-Hoffman combine for about 15 minutes of screen time despite being prominently billed on the coming attraction posters.
Sadly, Punch-Drunk Love has become one of the media darlings of 2002. Many critics point to the symbolism; when Barry fixes the harmonium, his life begins to come together. Barry punches a wall and "love" shows up tatooed on his fist...free frequent flyer miles with pudding purchases...yes, all moderately imaginative but who cares? The premise of Punch-Drunk Love is trite and the execution even more so. I suspect that this is precisely why so many artsy film buffs have embraced it; it allows them to make up reasons for its brilliance without them actually existing.
Review by Gabe Leibowitz: 3/10/03
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