Since it was first published to the internet last night, I've watched the trailer for Paul Thomas Anderson's adaptation of Thomas Pynchon's novel Inherent Vice some half-dozen times. It's a truly great trailer:

I can't stop thinking about all the things that make this trailer unique. For one thing, Joanna Newsom's narration starts so quickly and feels way too casual for a trailer. We're used to bombast, and Newsom's just talking to us, or maybe reading from a text she's comfortable with. The second thing is the pratfalls, which all look incredibly painful: You can't watch Joaquin Phoenix as Doc getting shoved aside by those cops and not picture the giant lakes of purple bruises that must've faded in on his hip by the next morning. And that final fall, the one where Doc takes a half-hearted swing at his attacker on the way down, is fucking hilarious. It's so accidental it must be on purpose, a Buster Keaton-style feint that demonstrates the kind of full-body control that allows you to look entirely incompetent on celluloid.

The way that Last Supper-esque tableau with the pizzas fades into Josh Brolin's truly weird attempts to order pancakes is a perfect break in the trailer's action. (Can any other actor transform himself so drastically from role to role without resorting to gimmicks like facial hair or makeup? Brolin is somehow barely recognizable in this role, and yet he looks exactly the same as he always does.) And then the trailer stops short again, when Doc fires his gun, only to restart when he asks his target if the shot was successful. The rhythm of this thing is completely off, but somehow it completely works.

I read and loved Inherent Vice and this trailer is full of moments from the novel. (Anderson reportedly collaborated with Pynchon on the writing and direction of the film.) It's a book that doesn't take itself seriously, a weed-infused stew of counterculture influences, old detective novels, and cultural commentary, and the trailer indicates that the film will follow suit. It's a real relief to see Anderson try his hand at being funny again. There Will Be Blood was a movie that growled with a dark variety of laughter, but The Master was a mirthless affair. Sorry, Interstellar, but all of a sudden this is the movie I'm most looking forward to this year. Even today's news that a Tetris movie is being developed as "a very big, epic sci-fi movie" isn't enough to turn me off from the cinematic pleasures of the Inherent Vice trailer.