Welcome to Monday Miniatures, where I tell you about some of the stuff I’ve been watching in the past week that I wouldn’t otherwise get to share.
The week of Sept. 22-28, 2025:
The Master, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
Inherent Vice, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
Phantom Thread, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
Licorice Pizza, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
One Battle After Another, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
How I watched them: The Master - Blu-ray; Inherent Vice - Amazon Prime; Phantom Thread - Amazon Prime rental; Licorice Pizza - Amazon Prime; One Battle After Another - In theaters (AMC Americana at Brand XL)
The second half of my Paul Thomas Anderson rewatch is complete, ending with a screening of One Battle After Another on opening night. I will have a full review of the film up this week, as well as some thoughts on the whole PTA catalogue and hopefully some other fun bric-a-brac. For the moment, I will say the new film is one of the best films of the year, certainly in the top tier of PTA works, and a movie people will be talking about for a long time.
Flow, directed by Gints Zilbalodis
How I watched it: 4k DVD
The only non-PTA film I had the chance to watch this week, this is my third time seeing Flow but first at home after seeing it twice in theaters. In addition to being one of the best films of last year, it was also one of my favorites, so the moment Criterion announced they would be releasing a 4k edition, I knew I would be getting it. The DVD was released Tuesday of last week and my pre-order arrived Friday. I immediately popped it in.
I chose to watch with the new Zilbalodis commentary track, which offers a ton of insight into the way the filmmaker thinks about character development and using action to move a story forward. He also shared the difficulties in working independently with open-source software – high-definition animation files have a tendency to overwhelm a PC – but also the freedom to tell the kind of story he wanted in his way.
After seeing the film in theaters, I called Flow one of the most gorgeously animated films ever made, and seeing it in 4k has done nothing to change that opinion. The richness of the background details, the smooth camera moves, and the beautiful interplay between light and shadow all come through wonderfully on this transfer. There remain shots in the film – even after listening to Zilbalodis explain how they were done – that I can’t fathom how they were done. I can’t wait to dig into the director’s other work, which is also included in the set.
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