Tag Archives: Joaquin Phoenix

So one of my favorite directors made an adaptation of a novel by my favorite writer. That’s a big deal.

In fact, it’s a huge deal. There was a time when I and friends who also read Thomas Pynchon thought that Mason & Dixon, his masterpiece from 1997, was his final effort. Then we figured the swan song was his sublime Against The Day, from 2006. Inherent Vice came along in 2009, and we finally realized that we were witness to a thriving, percolating phase in the lifetime of a literary master.

Director Paul Thomas Anderson read Inherent Vice in 2009 and rightly deduced that it would be the most filmable of Pynchon’s oeuvre. Oh, how I long for a Terry Gilliam adaptation of Mason & Dixon, with a big budget and perfect casting, but this does just fine for the time being. Besides, now it’s on record that audience interest in Pynchon adaptations exists. Maybe someday we’ll get Against The Day, or, since I’m really blue-skying here, Gravity’s Rainbow*. It’s now in the realm of possibility. Continue reading →