We didn’t get a chance to talk about Inherent Vice. How could we at ten-to one in the morning, as we stumbled out of the Prince Charles Cinema, at the back of Leicester Square, and made our way, appropriately as it turns out, through Chinatown? I don’t know if I was any clearer the next day. Even my morning swim couldn’t integrate the night’s images. The movie was all jumbled up — in my head, I mean — and still is to some extent. That’s surely by design. Paul Thomas Anderson has cited The Big Sleep as an influence on how he approached Thomas Pynchon’s novel and the vagaries of its plot. In other words, confusion reigns. Trailing a decade’s worth of morning-afters in its wake, we might need at least another decade before we can get a clear perspective on it. Either that or repeated viewings. One thing is clear: Inherent Vice is already assured of cult status, it is its own all-nighter, destined for late shows and flea pits the world over — if either of the latter still exists. Anderson’s film suggests they do, or makes it imperative that they are brought back. For he treats the medium of film — celluloid, be it 35mm or 70mm — as though it were a missing person: what happened to it? What happens if we follow the money? What would it take to revive it, to turn a tantalising flicker into a flame? And what are we supposed to do with all this longing? All of which is a good place to start if we want to get a handle on Inherent Vice.
—Mick McAloon
Running From The Reels 