One of the most hotly anticipated films of this festival season will not premiere for another month, which is just enough time to make us even more excited over the prospects for Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest. Inherent Vice will be the centerpiece of the New York Film Festival, where we all hope it will live up to the excitement surrounding it.
The film fetures a brilliant cast that includes Joaquin Phoenix, Benicio Del Toro, Josh Brolin, and Katherine Waterston, who has already been receiving some strong buzz for her performance. Phoenix is “Doc” Sportello, a pot-smoking detective who has to navigate the Los Angeles of 1970 while investigating the disappearance of an old girlfriend. He runs afoul of a number of underworld characters, including Brolin’s hippie-hating cop and Del Toro’s “drug-fueled” lawyer Sauncho Smilax.
Inherent Vice just recently received an R rating from the MPAA, with an impressive list of reasons that include drug use, sexual content, violence, and nudity. In other words, Anderson has pulled no punches in adapting Thomas Pynchon’s novel. Not that we expected he would; it’s just nice to know that there are some directors unafraid of that R rating.
Other details about Inherent Vice are being kept close to the chest until its premiere, but we do have a few new images of Del Toro, Phoenix, Brolin, and Waterston to continue to whet the appetite. Basically, I’m all for this film just as long as it comes somewhat close to the brilliance of Pynchon’s novel. Based on the photos we have seen so far, I do not think that I will be disappointed.
Inherent Vice premieres at the New York Film Festival on October 4, and will finally go into wide release on December 12. You can check out the latest images from the movie below.
