Rating: 
Summary: Ambition beautifully rendered
Review: I liked Hard Eight, and while i was impressed with boogie nights, i did not think that it was as deserving of all the raves, although it was still a very good movie. Magnolia however, i consider to be a nearly perfect film. It is about the most important things in life, family, love, anger, forgiveness, lies, truth, sin and beauty, simultaneously sentimental and brutal, obvious and deceptive.
The acting is inarguably superb, the most stunning facet of a film of much merit. The notes are all perfectly played, not a beat is missed. I consider this movie to be a masterpiece of plotting and editing; what could have been an overwritten mess seems intricately constructed and paced. This film is considered by some to be too long, but after watching it several times i was unable to find one scene that could be removed or redone without damaging the film.
What i have come to realize that is most to the honor of this film is that it has really stayed with me as so few films do. I find myself thinking of it often, and rethinking about its themes and characters. I absolutely love magnolia.
Rating: 
Summary: Written for Fiona Apple
Review: There's a good thirty to forty minute stretch of the three-hour Magnolia that is pure genius. But then the rest is either mediocre, confusing, and/or contemptible. The film is devoid of regular pacing. It drags on and then it ends abruptly just as things are picking up. It has odd captions of the Guy Ritchie order. It attempts to tell a story about characters related and unrelated, which creates an uneven mishmash of events. Is there a connection or isn't there? This film never attempts to aide the viewer on the solving of this mystery. To organize a bit, everything that's bad and good about the film can be attributed to writer-director, Paul Thomas Anderson. He takes the credit and the fault, exemplary of his upstaging of the material. But if someone is going to upstage a film, why not the brash brilliant Anderson? First the bad: there are some very rotten cliches in this film, from the rapping little black kid who speaks truths that bely his years to the black and white depiction of the insensitive father who lives his life through his kid. There are other things with the film such as it is very slow and very long, but overall these are challenges not problems. Magnolia follows interweaving storylines, the best, in my opinion, belonging to Tom Cruise as sex guru, Frank Mackey, a man quite tragic in the way he's deconstructed by a simple interview task, which explores his male aggression as a disguise for familial scarring due to his dying father, Earl Partridge (Jason Robards). Cruise brings an excellence and star power to the film that was needed among all the character actors (John C. Reilly, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Philip Baker Hall, Julianne Moore, Melinda Dillon, and Melora Walters--in a stunning, tender performance). Another great segment of the film belongs to Jeremy Blackman, a talented young actor capable of evoking sympathy without acting cute or mannered. He plays game show contestant Stanley Spector, a boy genius pushed to unreasonable standards by his father. Spector is based upon PTA's precociously famous girlfriend, Fiona Apple, who he also wrote it for. The game show event, in which Spector decides to take a stand against the adult establishment that has abused him, is one of the most powerful and gripping scenes in film history. What makes Magnolia eventually a success, aside from the themes and the captions and the raining frogs, is that PTA instills all of his characters- some children, some women, some adulters and abusers (who a less capable director might see as strictly "bad" people) and all damaged souls with a humanness and decency, both sad and uplifting. note: the music in this film is fantastic. aimee mann's songs and jon brion's (fiona apple's producer) score compliment and sometimes actually involve the action brilliantly.
Rating:
Summary: Simply brilliant film-making
Review: I was first introduced to PTA via "Boogie Nights." If you liked that film, you should love "Magnolia." Paul Thomas Anderson (fans call him PTA) sees life through the eyes of a film-maker. He gets his actors to act in ways you never thought they could. he gives them lines and films them in ways that draw you into their lives. Boogie Nights made me feel deeply for the porn actors it portrayed, and Magnolia made me love the deeply flawed individuals who haunted it. If you watch this film without crying, your heart has gone cold and black. Pay attention. That is the message. You have to pay as much attention to this film as PTA pays to his characters, and their situations, families, lives. Yes, it's a morality play at a time when we need morality plays. There is a right and a wrong, and strange things happen, but there is justice, and peace, and love after the rain of frogs. Magnolia itself is a rain of frogs, and nothing will ever be the same for you once you've succumbed to this beautiful, disturbing storm of emotions.
Rating:
Summary: Several movies rolled into one
Review: This is a long movie, but watching it didn't seem long, because of the masterful way the director has weaved the various human stories. The acting was great at all levels. The ending was a bit unbelievable but nevertheless did not take away from the power of this movie. I won't repeat other reviewer's comments, but basically this movie is several stories rolled into one. For me, I found the main theme running through was "pain", pain between father and son, pain between daughter and father, pain between relationships lost, pain in our everyday human lifes. This pain often runs deep, and may never heal. The human condition is fragile and lives with such pain all the time. Occasionally, that pain is lifted and gives rise to optimism. It's the way the director has compiled so many stories into one, dealing with the human condition, that makes this movie so powerful. When the pain is shown, it's intense. This movie will stay with you for a long-time.
Rating:
Summary: I really liked this movie.
Review: This was a great film about different people, and how their stories, or situations all come together during the course of one day. It's a film about forgiveness, and dealing with everyday problems. Every character in this film needs healing in one way or another. The acting and direction was great. Tom Cruise gave one of the best performances of 1999 and should have won that Oscar! I've never seen him so possessed by his character before. John Reilly gave a great performance also as a very spiritual police officer. William H. Macy gives a great performance as a man who is looking for love anywhere he can find it. Philip Seymore Hoffman is wonderful as Jason Robard's caretaker in the film. Julianne Moore and Robard's were both great! Every performance in this film was heartfelt and worthy of praise from both critics and audiences. PT Anderson is a great director, and certainly needs to write and direct more films. And finally, the ending....WOW! What an ending! I loved the whole frogstorm thing. I rewound that a few times just for the sheer joy of it. LOVED IT!!!!! All of this is great, but I feel that some of it could have been trimmed down a bit. It does run over three hours, and at times, certain scenes can become cloying, as they seem to just run on and on at a pointless rate. Some of those scenes just don't need to be as loooong as they are! That's my only complaint...well, that and the EXCESSIVE foul language. The F word does become annoying at a certain point. Not for everyone, but if you have an open mind, you will enjoy this treasure of a film!
Rating:
Summary: movie gets 5 stars, "bonus" disk gets 3...
Review: As a movie, I found Magnolia to be entrancing. Watch it at least for the ensemble cast (including Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Tom Cruise, Julianne Moore, Jason Robards, William H. Macy, etc. etc. etc.). Everyone did great, and the premise of colliding "coincidences" makes the movie unusual and entertaining. The bonus disk starts off well enough. An Aimee Mann video and a few short clips of Frank Mackey's sexist infomercials are great. I actually could have watched a half-hour of his product peddling (though the clip runs at just over three minutes... pity.). The only other thing you really get on the bonus disk is a dreadfully boring "video diary" from P.T. Anderson, who comes off as incredibally annoying and self-important. The diary clocks in at about 90 minutes but you'll be fast forwarding through it after about 10 minutes. It's hardly a bonus at all. Still, a bonus disk should be just that -- a bonus -- so I guess I shouldn't complain. If you enjoyed the movie, the video/audio quality is excellent, so I would recommend picking up this DVD. Just don't expect too much from the bonus disk.
Rating:
Summary: Stick With It and You Will be Rewarded
Review: First of all, this is is a long film. Everytime you think it is about to end, it starts up again, like a monster that won't die. In the end, it's worth it. All the performances by the ensemble cast are first rate.
The characters are all on the verge of a moral judgement. Some will be saved and some won't. The bizzare climax is weird and is on a Biblical scale.
It made me think of Robert Altman's Short Cuts.
Rating: 
Summary: I'm singing in the --- rain?
Review: This movie has a lot of depth. It also tries to do too much with itself. My wife couldn't stand it and thought it was a very long waste of her time. I'm not so sure. Each character is interesting. Each one is written well. Each one with one exception has a mouth on him or her. We have a chronicle of dysfunctional characters doing wrong and dysfunctional things. About half way through the picture I had the oddest feeling that there was a happy ending waiting for me. Since it is such a counter culture picture and the culture of the last 20 years celebrates all that is dysfunctional a counter culture picture can only be one of confidence and redemption and happy endings. We see that here. I'm sure PETA had a fit at the end of this picture. I also think that it could have achieved its ends without the stunt. It had the virtue of being totally unexpected and so irrational that it shocks people to reality (Sept 11th). Then again it could just be a cheep stunt for some guys who couldn't figure out how to get from a-b. Either way you'll find the performances all very good particularly by the supporting cast. (Three cheers for Henry Gibson who has more depth than anybody gives him credit) and if nothing else this movie will DEFINATELY give you something to talk about.
Rating:
Summary: PTA overshoots, still scores...
Review: I don't know if Paul Thomas Anderson will ever make a masterpiece. His last two films, BOOGIE NIGHTS and MAGNOLIA, are both too long and rambling to qualify. I would have enjoyed both more than I did (and I really, really liked both of them) had he narrowed his scope. The movie could have been shorter, and Julianne Moore's character could have been cut altogether, Still, I think MAGNOLIA deserves four stars, because it's filled with all of these wonderful little scenes and moments: the rain of frogs, the entire gameshow, the barfly who quotes "the lovely Samuel Johnson" (actually, it's Samuel Boswell where that line comes from), William H. Macy getting fired, John C. Reilly's speech at the end, and his interaction with the young rapper, Tom Cruise's self-help seminar, everything about Phillip Seymour Hoffman. As for the reviewers who complain about "wanting their three and a half hours back," what would you have done with them?
Rating:
Summary: 3 stars too much, 2 too few
Review: Sometimes, it takes a long time to tell a story. It should never have taken over three hours and 15 minutes to tell the stories in Magnolia, compelling as they are. This movie has an amazing cast and is visually rich and engaging. The performances -- even a sleazy character portrayed by Tom Cruise -- can't be topped. Each actor hands in a great turn. There are so many levels to the lives introduced here that for the first two hours, you don't mind the waiting game. It unfolds like the flower that gives the movie its name. However, as the last hour wears on, I became impatient. Forcing moviegoers to sit in witness to artistic vision for this long is simply arrogant, nothing more and nothing less.
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