Philip Seymour Hoffman
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“The Minute You Walk Out the Door You’re Risking Something”: Philip Seymour Hoffman on the Challenge of Acting
In a free-flowing interview with June Stein in the Spring, 2008 issue of BOMB Magazine, Philip Seymour Hoffman discusses the insights into acting he gleaned from his experience as a director. Early on there is the following remarkable exchange, in which Hoffman says that acting is not about embracing one’s first instincts: PS: … Actors’ first instinct is to make themselves feel comfortable, to do things to make themselves feel like they’re in it, they’re truthful; I’m moving over here and that feels right, blah, blah, blah…. That’s what I do; so when I see another actor doing that, I […]
by Scott Macaulay on Feb 3, 2014 -
Rest in Peace, Philip Seymour Hoffman
I spent most of yesterday caught in a self-centered malaise upon hearing that one of my favorite actors had passed away. An outpouring of eulogies — each distinct and personal, though unanimously carrying that sorrowful, grateful conclusion — drifted onto the internet, while I reflected in the only way I knew how: by watching his work. It takes more than a few hours or a days to wind your way through Philip Seymour Hoffman’s filmography, as he was not just blessed with great talent, but also, great taste. Nelson Carvajal of Press Play and Fandor has put together a nice […]
by Sarah Salovaara on Feb 3, 2014 -
Writer/Director Paul Thomas Anderson on The Master
What master do you worship? Does your master have a name — God, Yahweh, Allah, Vishnu, Great Spirit, Creator, Father, Mother — or remain nameless? Is He/She/It an abstraction — love, light, power — or have you met? Has your master sat across a table from you and asked you to account for your transgressions? Did you stare your master in the eyes without blinking? The Master, Paul Thomas Anderson’s sixth feature film, is an epic, 70mm story of tiny details that plays out viscerally on the most complicated expanse imaginable: The human face. Freddie Quell (Joaquin Phoenix), a snarling, […]
by James Ponsoldt on Sep 14, 2012 -
TRAILER WATCH: “THE MASTER”
The Master is Paul Thomas Anderson’s follow-up to There Will be Blood, my favorite film of that year. After this trailer I’m even more psyched.
by Scott Macaulay on Jul 19, 2012 -
MORE OF “THE MASTER”
Here’s the second bit of footage released from Paul Thomas Anderson’s forthcoming The Master, this time featuring Philip Seymour Hoffman (who plays the title character), as well as Joaquin Phoenix. As with the previous one, this is really a teaser/clip rather than an actual trailer, giving us a sense of only a small aspect of the film — rather than taking the usual trailer tactic of telling us 90% of the plot and compacting every notable or high-energy moment from the film into 90 seconds. As someone who likes to be surprised by movies, I hope that this refreshingly different […]
by Nick Dawson on Jun 19, 2012 -
“CHANGE YOU CAN BELIEVE IN” IS ALWAYS A GLASS MOSTLY EMPTY: ON “THE IDES OF MARCH”
Note: the following piece contains spoilers. One time in my fleeting youth, I encountered George Clooney in the Warner Brothers screening room on 53rd Street after a National Board of Review screening of Steven Soderbergh’s The Good German. This is before I had, despite my ongoing poverty and lack of renown, spent ample time around movie stars and the merely sort-of famous at sundry locations, both foreign and domestic, becoming relatively at ease in their strange company. I still often felt not unlike the protagonist of Walker Percy’s The Moviegoer, as he follows William Holden through a blustery New Orleans afternoon, sensing some […]
by Brandon Harris on Oct 6, 2011
