Boogie Nights is directed by Paul Thomas Anderson and stars an ensemble cast led by Mark Wahlberg, Burt Reynolds and Julianne Moore
Boogie Nights is Paul Thomas Anderson’s 1997 modern classic about
troubled, but well-endowed, teen Eddie Adams (Mark Wahlberg), who gets thrust
into the prolific and lucrative pornography empire ruled by director Jack Horner
(Burt Reynolds) in the late 1970s.
The film chronicles the lives of the people Eddie (later
re-christened as Dirk Diggler) meets in the adult industry, and how he was able
to find a comforting family in Horner’s sex-fueled household, made up of fellow porn stars Amber Waves
(Julianne Moore), Rollergirl (Heather Graham) and Reed Rothchild (John C. Reilly). We meet the characters at
their seeming peak – with an overall look and vibe that encapsulates the aesthetics of
porn films of the era – until we witness their fall from grace, paralleled with
the drastic changes brought about by the introduction of videocassette
technology that eventually put an end to the “Golden Age of Porn.”
Boogie Nights is a powerhouse movie driven by solid
performances from everyone in the cast all throughout, highlighted by Wahlberg,
Reynolds, Moore and Don Cheadle as porn star-cum-audiophile Buck.
Clocking in at 2 hours and a half, the movie features stunning
visuals – set up by a greatly well-composed and directed opening sequence, and
gripping storytelling. The film’s first half works as a satirical comedy about
the excesses of fame, with the other half turning it upside down to see how the
characters’ fortunes come back to bite them in their all-too-exposed asses.
RATING: 5/5 Bags
of Chips