We saw this tonight. I don't know just what to think about it. Yes, it has two epic performances by Philip Hoffman (Lancaster Dodd) and Joachin Phoenix (Freddie Quell), as you suspect. As for plot and narrative, it's a muddled story. Phoenix is a post WW II wandering alcoholic with tendencies to violence, a guy who can whip of the meanest batch of drink you ever had, especially if there's some paint thinner or lysol available. He's seriously damaged goods. He gets roped into a family cult by Hoffman, not because he believes, so much as that he doesn't know what else to do at the moment. Hoffman's character seems to like Quell as a challenging convert, but also because he too has an occasional taste for paint thinner.
Is this about Hubbard and Scientology? I don't know enough about either to have an opinion, but Dodd definitely made up his own pseudo-religious self improvement regimen that seems like a cult...draw your own opinions. None of the characters in this movie are likable at all, neither Quell, nor Dodd, nor Dodd's female followers, nor the military or police or anybody. I thought I was mistaken but two other people also thought that the movie implied homoerotic moments between Quell and Dodd, but that plot didn't materialize either.
Phoenix apparently lost a LOT of weight for this role. He looks as pathetic as his character, wrinkled, slouchy, wasted and too lean.
It's definitely an interesting movie. Will it get reactions similar to the last meandering movie I saw, The Tree of Life? Will it be popular? Is it Hubbard and Scientology? I just don't know.
