Paul Thomas Anderson Movies: Ranked! (And discussion)

[The Firebird]

The protagonists were also caricatures. The stuff that French 75 members yell all sounds good in isolation, maybe, but doesn't add up to a coherent worldview or overall goal.

And the inability of the guy working the phones midway through the movie to give a straight answer in the middle of an active crisis because he felt obliged to do a bunch of performative stuff was a pretty sharp critique, for instance.

Yeah, totally agree with you there! The way some of the characters,

Spoiler: spoiler

after a harrowing escape, are caught because they relax by drinking and driving,

is another instance. And it doesn't seem like anyone has learned anything by the end. It's incompetence vs cruelty, forever.

Anyway, in general I think satire just doesn't do it for me.