'Boogie Nights' is an early Paul Thomas Anderson film, that expands upon his 1988 mockumentary short 'The Dirk Diggler Story'. Both films follow the rise and fall of a 1970's & 80's porn star who goes by the name Dirk Diggler, Mark Wahlberg plays him in the latter film. Real name Eddie Adams, Diggler is a none-to-bright-bulb who is very well endowed sexually. Porn producer/director Jack Horner (played by Burt Reynolds in his only Oscar nominated performance, and the actor would express very mixed feelings about taking the part) would guide him through tremendous success within the burgeoning pornographic film industry, though ego, aging and drug abuse would shatter his career and lay him quite low, the film contains a morally gray coda of Diggler again entering the porn scene in the mid 80's.
When glancing at review quotes about the film on Rotten Tomato's I saw one writer note that watching this movie is a very complicated film going experience, and with that I would concur. This film progresses from period drama, to comedy, to tragedy, though these veins flow into each other throughout. It is kind of difficult to get a grasp on what this movie is.
Among other things it's an ensemble piece, Dirk is the primary focus and our main through line character, but the picture has a board Altmane-sque cast of characters, and it presents them as more or less what they are, warts and all, without going out of its way to judge them for you.
The rich cast includes Don Cheadle, John C. Reilly, William H. Macy, Heather Graham, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Philip Baker Hall. Julianne Moore has a heartbreaking role as porn star who goes by the name of Amber Waves, a cocaine addicted wreck who is desperate to regain some custody over her children, but who is not fit to have them despite her legitimate love for them.
I thought here that Reynold's had the most interesting part, a sort of 'nice guy' pornographer', he is ultimately exploiting these people, taking advantage of them, but he also seems to care for them, can be generous and forgiving. I thought about it for a bit and Hugh Heffner comes to mind, a very pleasant, likable personality, in some ways quite progressive, but at the end of the day he's making his money off porn, and porn can crush people, before the camera, behind the camera, and watching on screen.
The film is unsettling, though it can also be gripping, sad and funny. I'd heard comparisons to the work of Quinton Tarentino, which I mostly thought over stated, with the expectation of one, maybe two rather Tarentio-esque sequences late in the film. Again this is more like Robert Altman then perhaps anything else.
This is a film that I think at some point I am going to need to revisit, it really leaves an impression, even if your not sure what exactly to make of it by the end. ****
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