Culture Snob Magnolia Class Outline

Instructor

Jeff Ignatius

Description

An in-depth exploration of Paul Thomas Anderson’s 1999 film Magnolia, particularly its contradictions: chaos and intense pain resolved with simple truths, postmodernism and surreality at war with earnestness and convention. A portion of the film will be shown each day, followed by discussion.

Schedule

Day 1: beginning of the film through 0:43:15.

Day 2: 0:43:15 through 1:38:47.

Day 3: 1:38:47 through 2:17:13.

Day 4: 2:17:13 through the end of the film.

General Prompts

Why are you taking this class?
How is Magnolia unusual in the context of contemporary American cinema?
In the New Yorker review of Magnolia, David Denby wrote: “Most of it is fairly commonplace, Arthur Miller-type stuff about how you can’t escape the past, you can’t escape the evil you’ve done, and what we all really need is to be truthful with one another.” How is the criticism that the film is banal valid? How is it not?
Anderson’s movie bears many striking resemblances – superficial and thematic – to Robert Altman’s Short Cuts. How are they similar, and how are they different? Can Magnolia be viewed as a reaction or response to Altman’s film?
Magnolia has ten major characters and a running time of more than three hours, yet it is remarkably lucid. How does the structure of the movie make it so easy to follow?
Each major character serves as an obvious point of comparison for another major character – in terms of legal relationships (spouses and children), background (Donnie Smith and Stanley Spector), or narrative function (Jim Kurring and Phil Parma). How do these analogies enrich the meaning of the movie?
Who is your favorite character in Magnolia, and why? Is that the character to whom you relate most?
Several major characters “confess” in the course of the movie. How could one read Magnolia as a commentary on the secularization of urban American culture?
Each major character has or is in the middle of a major crisis, ranging from the relatively trivial (a child peeing his pants while on national television) to the mortal (inoperable cancer). Yet the movie treats each of them with similar gravity and weight. What is the function of this equalization? Does it minimize the suffering of Jimmy Gator and Earl Partridge? Alternatively, does it purposely elevate even minor crises to reflect the character’s in-the-moment experience?
While there are three major female characters, Magnolia is dominated by its men. What is the movie’s relationship with women, particularly in light of “Seduce and Destroy”?
Paul Thomas Anderson has daddy issues. Discuss.

Important Details

What does the title mean?
How and why do television and the city of Los Angeles play such a critical role in Magnolia?
Only one major character is overtly religious, but one particular biblical allusion (Exodus 8:2 – “And if thou refuse to let them go, behold, I will smite all thy borders with frogs”) abounds. Aside from the obvious, what does that reference mean in the context of the narrative?
What are we to make of the frogs?
Anderson primarily employs two sets of music: Aimee Mann’s songs and an orchestral score by Jon Brion. What roles do music and its absence play in the movie?
A storytelling motif is established by the prologue. How does it play out in the rest of the movie?
Ironic coincidence is also invoked in the opening stories, yet the narrative proper doesn’t fulfill the promise; there are no chance encounters as implausible as those in the initial three tales. What does the prologue accomplish as a framing device?
The main story features two key metatextual moments: Phil Parma’s plea to the “Seduce and Destroy” customer-service representative, and the sing-along.
Why did Anderson choose to remind his audience that they were watching a movie, a fiction?

Curiosities

Some people claim Magnolia has nine major characters; I say it has ten. Does it matter? What are the arguments for and against Rose Gator being counted as a primary player?
What is the significance of “It is dangerous to confuse children with angels” outside of its obvious meaning related to Donnie and Stanley? (The saying, incidentally, is attributed to David Fyfe.)
Two major family names are drawn from animals: Gator and Partridge. Is this meaningful?
Jimmy Gator’s wife and Earl Partridge’s dead wife are named for flowers – Rose and Lily, respectively. Important? Related to the movie’s title?
Why is the game show What Do Kids Know? so anachronistic and so full of arcane and nearly impossible tasks?
Race is not a dominant theme in Magnolia, yet it’s hard to ignore the film’s treatment of its black characters. Is Anderson trying to make a commentary on race? If so, what is it? Is the movie racist?
Some viewers have noted a reference by Donnie Smith to the book of Psalms. Chapter 8, Verse 2: “Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength because of thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger.” Is this important?