By Ada-Padz
Paul Thomas Anderson. He was born on January 1, 1970 in Studio City, California and grew up in the Valley. His father Ernie Anderson was a well known voice-over artist for American T.V. Paul created the character name Ghoulardi for his production company. He also has two brothers & four sisters.
The young Paul hated School. Rules, and being taught what to do, never appealed to him much and he had to leave the Buckley School in sixth grade because of fighting and bad grades. After Montclair College Prep High School, he spent two semesters as an English major at Emerson before dropping out, and then enrolled at New York University Film School.
Stubborn and persistence became, to some people, Paul’s faults but ultimately became his strong attitude.
Paul developed an un-healty passion for filmmaking at an early age and started his brilliant career as a production assistant on various television shows in Los Angeles and New York.
The L.A. born rebel soon became good friends with a young struggling actor known as John C. Reilly. The 34-year-old actor, who grew up in Chicago's dicey Southwest side, has now become the director's somewhat unlikely, rugged hero in several of his movies.
Just like Scorcese has De Niro, Anderson has Reilly, allways by his side, willing for more action.
The pair can only sing each others praises. Anderson tells Reilly he is his “Biggest fan”, and Reilly sincerely sees Anderson as a "genius."
The maverick filmmaker had actually penned ‘Hard Eight’, originally titled Sydney, with Reilly in mind.
His first film, the Las Vegas-set ‘Hard Eight’, won glowing critical reviews. A solid, fast-paced tale of obsurd love has all the Anderson classics. Anderson regulars Reilly and Philip Baker Hall give great performances as does one Gwyneth Paltrow.
His second effort, ‘Boogie Nights’, was simply a joy to watch. A clear sensitive, sometimes tragic, character-driven portrayal of the late seventies booming porn industry. The film shows a simple sleazy subculture of innocent lost souls who slowly end up, through ego and mutual respect, a surrogate family in order to survive each other.
The characters, especially Dirk, are all on a mission of total self destruction, fuelled on by cocaine and too much money. The deleted scenes on the DVD show how, in one scene, Dirk totally wreck’s his new red car.
Anderson has been labelled as the new ‘Robert Altman’ and his movies called "Altmanesque" but they are difficult to categorise. Anderson knows how to handle single and multi-narrative stories and keep you gripped until the final frame. The ending of ‘Magnolia’ is so unexpected it could almost be confusion personified in the frogs?
Everyone has there problems and confusion in the film.
Anderson is truly gifted with a special eye for detail and story telling. Critics have started giving Anderson comparisons to movie giants Welles and Huston. One day he will be bigger than both. Now that will not be chance.
Hard Eight - Film Comment declared Paul Thomas Anderson the most promising director of 1997.
Boogie Nights - Critical acclaim and three Academy Award nominations - Received the Boston Society of
Film Critics Award for Best New Filmmaker - The PEN Centre, USA West Literary Award for Best Screenplay.
Magnolia - Received tremendous critical praise placing it at the top of many critic's 10 Best Lists - Awarded prestigious Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival - Received three Academy Award nominations for Best Original Screenplay - Best Supporting Actor for Tom Cruise - Best Original Song - Aimee Mann's Save Me.