Not everyone loved Paul Thomas Anderson's Inherent Vice - that much is clear from the dismal box office takings (that's probably the last time Anderson and Warner Bros. will be working together for a while). Still, this 1970-set, stoner detective oddity had one element probably every viewer could agree on all the same: as Doc Sportello, Joaquin Phoenix proves he's on one hell of a roll. Like a younger version of The Big Lebowski's The Dude before he decided to just stop working altogether, Inherent Vice's Doc Sportello is the noir antihero reimagined as a bumbling private eye - with an afro, occasionally - and Phoenix plays it like he's never had so much fun. Mutton-chopped, constantly trailed by a marijuana fog, pretty regularly confused, this is Joaquin Phoenix's masterpiece of comedy. Tragedy, too - Inherent Vice is melancholic throughout, but it never gets sadder than when Sportello sees sparring partner Bigfoot Bjornsen (Josh Brolin) eat a face-full of hash in a moment of madness, prompting tears to stream down Phoenix's face, as his harmless hippie in that moment sees the '60s counterculture die before him.
Lover of film, writer of words, pretentious beyond belief. Thinks Scorsese and Kubrick are the kings of cinema, but PT Anderson and David Fincher are the dashing young princes. Follow Brogan on twitter if you can take shameless self-promotion: @BroganMorris1
