The Master, dir. Paul Thomas Anderson

The thing I like about Paul Thomas Anderson's films is that they make me excited about fiction in general. The characters are rounded and human in a way that is normally complimented using the term "literary," but Anderson's films are firmly films, and tell stories using interposed images. Interposed and carefully composed; I never get the sense he is using a shot simply to cover the action. The distance of the camera from the actor and the way the actor moves or does not move through the frame is meaningful and intentional in a way more often associated with Kubrick but without Kubrick's emotional distance; nobody would accuse Anderson of caring more about photographs than people. Not even when he is shooting in gorgeous 65mm.

Yep.

From an interview in the Hairpin with MacArthur fellow Susan Murphy:

Does being a statistician make you read the news differently? Are you always looking at polling or study reports and thinking that things are poorly designed, or interpreted incorrectly?

Oh yeah. I see alternative explanations for results in the news all the time.

Does that bother you?

Well, I've got this viewpoint—and I don't know if this is very mature—but I think it's a big game out there, and we all have to be prepared to play it. Everyone is trying to frame things in their own way, and we all have to try and be as educated as possible so we can understand the degree to which it's a game, and know if someone's trying to pull the wool over our eyes. Even if it's someone I agree with!

That's why I wish more logical thinking was taught in high school. Many people will never use algebra again, but logic and statistics, you can use that in real life. You need to be critical about new drugs coming out, about numbers you see. People understand that critical thinking is important from a qualitative point of view, but it's just as important from a quantitative point of view. I wish they taught that stuff everywhere, and earlier. Like for someone who doesn't go to college—I think a really good life is to become an electrician or plumber, for example. They make a lot of money, it's stable, but maybe they didn't get an advanced critical thinking education that would benefit them just living in the world. Why didn't they get that? Why shouldn't they get that?