Phantom Thread: Distant Love, Burning Desire, the New Year's Eve Scene
“I think it's the expectations and assumptions of others that cause heartache,” says Reynolds Woodcock (Daniel Day-Lewis), the center of Paul Thomas Anderson’s 2017, six-time Academy Award-nominated masterwork, Phantom Thread.
Phantom Thread follows Reynolds Woodcock, a scrupulous, renowned dressmaker in 1950s post-war London, as he falls for his benevolent, yet resolute muse, Alma (Vicky Krieps), who becomes the only thing in his life that he cannot maintain control over.Paul Thomas Anderson can craft short memorable scenes in his filmography that encapsulate the quintessence of the entire emotion and tone of his films. Scenes that come to mind are the processing scene from his 2012 epic of the soul, The Master, or from 2021’s adolescent love story, Licorice Pizza, where the two lovers run towards each other as night falls, intercut with earlier moments of their running escapades. These scenes are usually pocket-sized pieces of the film, yet without them, those films would never be the same. The same principle applies to Phantom Thread.
Out of the entire two-hour runtime, there is a five-minute scene that will never escape my consciousness: The New Year’s Eve scene. This scene takes up less than four percent of the film yet proves to be the most powerful and presiding. The scene starts with the two, Alma and Reynolds, sitting in silence. Reynolds draws a dress pattern in his notebook and Alma looks at him as if building up the courage to declare a long meticulously thought-out statement, though she already knows what Reynold’s reaction will be. She states, “I want to go dancing” to which after some small back and forth, Reynolds responds with, “You’re joking,” as if what Alma has just said is some sort of sarcastic gag.
Reynolds keeps his head down, not budging one bit, as Alma loudly scoots her chair across the floor and trudges up the staircase, Reynolds’ exterior reacts unfazed, but certainly bruised his interior. A few moments later, Alma clinks and clanks her high heels down the stairs, wearing the dress Reynolds crafted for her, and exits the house with a piercing door slam. Reynolds cannot help but look, then returns to his drawing, acting resolutely. Moments pass and Reynolds stands smug at the door, debating whether he should stay or go.
The scene cuts and the viewer is propelled to the dance hall; Reynolds rushes up the balcony stairs. He gets to the balcony, overlooking the rambunctious festivities going on below, full of people clapping, bagpipes playing, and large floats fit for a Disney World parade. Cast in shadow, Reynolds is overtaken by the manic environment surrounding him, yet the balcony is almost desolate of life. Looking upon the chaos of the crowd, his eyes dart around searching for Alma, right as the announcer asks the crowd, “Are you ready to welcome in our glorious, happy, new year?” to which the crowd responds with cheering and hoorah starting the countdown from “ten.” As the announcer reaches “one,” Alma has yet to be spotted. Balloons of the new year fall to the ground, and Reynolds finally spots her. He stares on, rigid, unable to believe his eyes, she dances, and laughs, as if she is a little girl, emotions that have not crossed her face in some, some time. But that happiness is short-lived as a skirmish breaks out next to her, propelling Reynolds to leave his post and run to her aide.
As Reynolds gets down to the bottom floor, the scene jump cuts, accentuating Reynold’s disjointed headspace as he pushes partygoers out of the way, bumps into sailors, and cowboys, and gets knocked in the head by a paper-mâché dog head, which he looks back on as if he is going to start throwing haymakers. Finally, finding his way to Alma, who is standing arms crossed against a wall, looking down, with slouched shoulders. The two are frozen. Reynolds stares quizzically at her, she looks up with tears falling from her face, the air has been sucked out of the room. The silence between the two is quietly deafening, as all the diegetic sound fades out and what’s left is Johnny Greenwood’s track “Alma.” Reynolds tilts his chin up to non-verbally say, “what do you have to say for yourself,” but Alma cannot say anything, she just stares. All she wanted was to dance. All she wanted was to celebrate the new year. Earlier in the film, after the first date the two have, Reynolds, tells Alma, “If you want to have a staring contest you will lose,” Alma smirks. Yet, this staring contest is no different, Reynolds has won this contest, but he has stolen her fun and ruined her night. As they stare, they wonder why they are still with each other. He grabs her arm as if to drag her out of the party. Alma stands still, not budging, then Reynolds stares on again, and pulls once more, finally, Alma gives in, and the two-exit frame as the scene holds on the partygoers who continue to dance, parade around, and kiss under merry drunkenness.
This is where the couple’s felicity has ended. Their relationship is bleak and wretched, their love has slowly been growing more and more distant, reaching a tipping point. The flame of burning desire has been smothered. Disappointment and lost love have arrived, and the honeymoon stage has been long gone. When you cannot move forward, and you have already moved backward, where can you go? When you have hit rock bottom, but you cannot get yourself outside the hole, what do you do? Anderson suggests that maybe you do not move at all. You stay stationary. When the film could have ended after the New Year’s Eve scene, it does not. In the next twelve minutes, the viewer discovers just how Anderson proposes you stay stationary; poison. Alma poisons Reynolds to the point of vomiting, in which Reynolds has no other choice but to relinquish his control to Alma. Reynolds knowingly and willingly accepts this poison, going as far as to say to Alma, “Kiss me, my girl, before I am sick.” He finally lets her take care of him, like his mother that constantly visits him in his dreams, realizing that he needs to relax a little.
There is an overarching idea of I love you, but you are my poison, and yet many of us consciously and continuously indulge in the poison. Why? Who knows, but this film reminds us that even at Reynolds’ worst, he knows deep inside that he wants to be loved and admired, just as he wants to be driven mad by the smallest scrapes of spreading butter on toast or someone sipping the tea too loudly during breakfast. There is nothing predictable about Reynolds, except making him sick. When he is sick, he is weak, and when he is weak, he has no control, and when he has no control, he is at peace.
As Reynolds says, “A house that doesn't change is a dead house.”
Author: Ethan Elkins
Artist: Solymar Estrella
