Paul Thomas Anderson has ascended to an exalted position in American cinema. Marked out by accomplished work evoking the 1970s directors on which he was raised, it was, however, 2007’s There Will Be Blood that put his ambition and unique vision on full display. With The Master, the idiosyncrasies of theme and voice grow into a wonderful piece of cinema. However, as grand a landmark as it is, the film never coheres thematically as well as There Will Be Blood or even 1999’s Magnolia.

Joaquin Phoenix plays Freddie Quell, an emotionally damaged member of the US Navy. Upon the cease of hostilities in World War II, Quell immediately drains a torpedo of fuel to concoct some horrific moonshine. A shambling drunkard, Quell loses his post-war job as a mall photographer and begins to drift, finding work on a cabbage farm before being chased out – his latest concoction poisoning a fellow worker. This delivers him serendipitously into the world of Lancaster Dodd (Philip Seymour Hoffman) – leader of a cultish movement called The Cause. Fascinated by Quell, and his alcoholic alchemy, Dodd takes him on as “guinea pig and protégé”. The directionless Quell gives himself to Dodd and The Cause as the film charts their symbiotic relationship.

The 70mm print (of which the Arts Picturehouse seems to be the only venue outside the ODEON West End to show it in this format the UK) and the cinematography of Mihai Malaimare Jr (whose work on Coppola’s Tetro was magnificent) has captured the wonderfully expressive face of Phoenix, which is very much the centre of the film. In possibly his best role to date, the phrase ‘damaged goods’, thrown around carelessly throughout cinema and television, has never been better displayed through body language than Phoenix’s awkward gait and evasive speech patterns.

Lancaster Dodd has been likened to Scientology founder L Ron Hubbard, and there are many clear parallels. However, to label Dodd as such would deal too much with specifics, which is something that The Master has no intention of doing. Subtleties of tone and theme are what Anderson seeks to achieve (perhaps too subtly), and Dodd is better considered as a representation of the charismatic preacher archetype that seems to grow especially well in the American greenhouse. Dodd and The Cause represent all these movements preying on lost souls such as Quell, drawing them into their Machiavellian machines lubricated by snake oil.

Where There Will Be Blood examined the damaging effects of raw ambition and insatiable capitalism in developing America, The Master, if anything, looks at those left behind by it and how they are taken advantage of. In the post-war landscape, Quell is adrift and out of step. The American Dream, which he and his fellow sailors are encouraged to pursue at the film’s outset, is no more tangible to him than Dodd’s ‘proof’ of past lives going back ‘trillions’ of years. By focusing on Quell, the character aspects of The Master are more layered. Anderson has covered showmanship that sells damaging or misguided life choices with Daniel Plainview (There Will Be Blood) and even Tom Cruise’s Frank T. J. Mackey (Magnolia). As excellent as Seymour Hoffman is, there is little need to retread this ground explicitly.

However, the film threatens to collapse under the weight of this thematic bulk. Anderson revisits many themes covered in his previous features: relationships with father figures; the nature of regret for life choices; the lasting impact of dysfunctional relationships. Magnolia examined these with an ensemble, but by refracting these through Quell alone Anderson risks obfuscation. The Master, as a result, often feels like an unwieldy adaptation of a dense novel.

Despite this thematic fog, much of what marked Anderson out has its most pointed expression here: the understanding of tone; the excellent character contrast and storytelling through shot composition and camerawork; another superb Jonny Greenwood score. The Master is a singularly magnificent piece of work, which sadly never quite coheres in the fashion of Anderson’s previous work. It is a wonderfully frustrating journey, though, that will have the grey matter sparking in a way that few films do.