Review: Phantom Thread
By parts beguiling, quietly devastating, and surgically cruel, Phantom Thread, the latest from writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson, is also, quite significantly, the purported swan song of Daniel Day-Lewis.
What can one say about the actor, named by Time magazine as the "World's Greatest Actor" in 2012, that hasn't already been said by critics, audiences and the three Best Actor Oscars he has received for a trio of vastly different portrayals: as a man stricken with cerebral palsy in My Left Foot, a ruthless and domineering oilman in There Will Be Blood, and the stately 16th President of the United States in Lincoln. That a sense of melancholy flickers now and again whilst viewing Phantom Thread is inevitable - one feels both a swell of gratitude to have been gifted with 21 films over his 46-year-long career, but also more than a tinge of regret that there won't be more opportunities to observe the actor's gift of marrying faultless technicality with endless reserves of emotional depth.
In the Fifties-set Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis embodies one Reynolds Woodcock, a master dressmaker living and working in London. A confirmed bachelor, he's surrounded by women - whether it be his high society customers, his cadre of seamstresses, his sister Cyril (Lesley Manville), who manages the day-to-day operations of his atelier, or the parade of romantic partners who are as wholly embraced as they are discarded. If he's lost his appetite for his latest paramour Johanna (Camilla Rutherford) in the film's opening moments, it's soon regained upon meeting Alma (Vicky Krieps), the waitress who takes his order at a countryside restaurant.
And what an order: "Welsh rabbit. With a poached egg on top, please. Not too runny. And bacon. Scones. Butter. Cream. Jam. Not strawberry. And some sausages." Never has a listing been so riveting and psychologically revealing, but that's the power of Daniel Day-Lewis for you. This scene reinforces Reynolds' inherent fastidiousness, specific particularities, obsessive-compulsive nature, and godlike tendencies. "I could give you breasts...if I wanted to," he remarks as he pins and tucks a muslin on her. Yet he's dashing and irresistibly charming, so it's perfectly understanding why Alma would be swept into his orbit even if she has to contend with the quietly fearsome Cyril, who literally sniffs her out at their first meeting and, after Reynolds takes her measurements, assesses, "You have the ideal shape. He likes a little belly."
If Cyril hasn't already recalled Judith Anderson's menacing Mrs. Danvers from Rebecca by this point, then you need to brush up on your gothic-tinged romances and your Alfred Hitchcock for Phantom Thread especially abounds with references to the latter, who remains the undisputed maestro at painting portraits of toxic masculinity. Nods to Rebecca, Notorious, and Vertigo are very much woven into Phantom Thread's fabric, not only thematically but biologically as well. This is a film that in structure, texture, and execution feels like it was made in the Fifties - its pacing, its beats, the way it transitions from scene to scene are very much of the time. It's an approach that may not appeal to more modern senses for it's not necessarily the same type of formal exercise in recreating a particular film's or filmmaker's style as Far From Heaven and Carol were for Todd Haynes or Psycho was for Gus Van Sant. Yet at no point does this tactic feel fusty or mere simulation. The film is both of its time and out of it, resulting in a certain otherworldliness that undergirds the air of "quiet death" that permeates the film.
Though Alma is the designated innocent in the tradition of Rebecca's second Mrs. de Winter and Vertigo's Madeleine/Judy and allows herself to be moulded to his desires, she is not as pliable as she appears. The magnificent Krieps bears a passing resemblance to Ingrid Bergman, she of Hitchcock's Notorious, Spellbound, and Under Capricorn, not only facially but in her deceptively fragile resilience and rooted earthiness. "I can stand endlessly. No one can stand for as long as I can," she remarks of her position as Reynolds' latest muse, but she is no mere mannequin. Indeed, she may be one to bend but at no point does she ever break, unafraid of disagreeing with either Cyril or Reynolds and even, slowly but surely, imposing her own will over Reynolds.
"My name is Alma, and I live here," she asserts at one point and her determination to maintain her identity in the face of his infantile tyranny provides much of the film's suspenseful momentum. Their clashes are a marvel to witness - their voices never raised, the words superficially innocuous but viciously cutting. "Maybe you have no taste", "Maybe I like my own taste" goes one exchange. "It's too much movement," he complains of the way she eats her breakfast. During another food-related incident, Reynolds self-congratulates, "I'm admiring my own gallantry for eating it the way you've prepared it."
As lush and romantic as it is surreal and perverse, Phantom Thread is an exquisite and insinuating masterwork, threading itself in one's marrow and embedding itself in the memory. It strengthens Manville's standing as one of the more underrated actresses of her time, introduces Krieps as an immense talent to watch, and gifts audiences with one (hopefully not) final superb showing from Day-Lewis who shall be most sorely missed.
Phantom Thread
Directed by: Paul Thomas Anderson
Written by: Paul Thomas Anderson
Starring: Daniel Day-Lewis, Lesley Manville, Vicky Krieps, Richard Graham, Camilla Rutherford, Harriet Sansom Harris, Brian Gleeson, Julia Davis, Nicholas Mander, Lujza Richter, Gina McKee
