`MAGNOLIA' SIMPLY A CINEMATIC MASTERPIECE.

Byline: Bob Strauss Film Critic

''Magnolia'' is an exuberant outburst of creative genius and lavish emotionalism. Only the third feature from writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson, it succeeds at a level of possibility most filmmakers can't even conceive of, let alone grasp. The film is so audacious and uncompromising that it's likely to make as many enemies as it does partisans, but don't be mistaken: ``Magnolia'' is the only true end-of-the-millennium masterpiece, an achievement that will be hard to match for many years to come - and whose influence should rightly be felt well into the next century.

The movie is an ensemble piece marked by compassionately devastating insights into human weakness, a narrative structure as complex as it is inventive and a mildly abstract quality that, combined with other elements, makes it all play like a great piece of music. It's set during a 24-hour period in the San Fernando Valley (Anderson's hometown and the setting for his excellent ``Boogie Nights''), and it quite persuasively captures the area's elusive ambience while illuminating feelings that anyone, anywhere could recognize - but (and this is where so much of the genius lies) in terms so utterly, imaginatively specific, they seem shockingly new.

``Magnolia'' charts the spiritual misadventures of nine main characters and an equal number of key supporting ones, all of whom face down personal crises of generally shattering import. The individual stories interweave, counterpoint and sometimes influence one another, but the overall impression is one of general isolation breached by small, vital acts of connecting grace. The orchestration of desperate lives follows a superficially nonsensical, three-part prologue and climaxes under a wildly peculiar act of God.

Game-show producer Earl Partridge (Jason Robards) lays dying in his comfortable home. A pack of yappy dogs attends him, along with Phil (Philip Seymour Hoffman), a young home health-care nurse who evidently cares more about the old man than his much younger wife, Linda (Julianne Moore), does. But looks are deceptive; Linda may spend most of the drizzly day driving her Mercedes from lawyer to shrink to pharmacy and back, popping pills and cursing up a storm at anyone she meets, but is she really being driven by vulgar materialism, or by unbearable tenderness?

Along a parallel track (and it is astonishing how deftly Anderson has created characters who not only mirror, but reflect upon, one another), the beloved host of Earl's show, Jimmy Gator (Philip Baker Hall) longs to patch things up with his estranged adult daughter now that he's been diagnosed with cancer. But Claudia Gator (Melora Walters) is too angry and coked-out to accept her father's overtures. When a lonely-hearted North Hollywood cop, Jim Kurring (John C. Reilly), comes by to tell her to turn the stereo down, he falls in love.

Rounding out the main cast are Jeremy Blackman's Stanley Spector, a child genius about to hit it big on the game show, and William H. Macy's Donnie Smith, once its biggest star and now an abject adult failure. And calling more attention to himself than anybody is Tom Cruise, in by far the most outlandish and finest performance of his profitable career, as the despicable but understandable Frank Mackey, a self-help lecturer whose whole act is making guys feel good by denigrating women. Cruise is so wickedly sharp, infuriatingly piggish and reluctantly vulnerable in the role that he would easily steal the movie from his equally weighted co-stars if Anderson were any less a master of egalitarian emotional tone.

As it stands, everyone's issues bear equivalent poignancy, and we can't help but appreciate every actor's finely tuned performance.

But as impressive as they are, Anderson's people skills are only half the story. With expert help from director of photography Robert Elswit and editor Dylan Tichenor (both ``Boogie'' collaborators), he composes ``Magnolia's'' human and formal elements into a unique kind of cinematic symphony. There's a 40-minute section in the long movie's midsection during which Jon Brion's driving score never ceases, while all the participants' traumas build to crescendo pitch. The segment is a sheer masterpiece of montage and tempo, but it's only one example of how ``Magnolia'' powerfully dissolves the barrier between movie and music.

Aimee Mann's telling songs sometimes overwhelm the dialogue tracks, but only when they have more to say about what's really going on than the characters' self-deluding words. At one point, actors in different scenes actually sing along to Mann's aching anthem ``Wise Up''; it's a bold and breathtakingly touching break-the-movie-illusion gambit. So is Earl's riskily unaccompanied recitation of his life's regrets, during which Robards' voice croakingly rises into the ether as if to warn other characters in the throes of their own mistakes.

Of course, the unrelenting richness of Anderson's artistry and honesty has already earned ``Magnolia'' the overindulgence charge. All that can really be said to counter such criticism is that the grumps say ``indulgent'' like it's a bad thing. With ``Magnolia,'' Anderson invites us to luxuriate in a profound vision of wayward, striving humanity. Accepting his invitation is not an easy commitment, to be sure. But the rewards of taking Anderson up on his own terms are among the greatest this century of cinema has ever offered.

The facts

The film: ``Magnolia'' (R; language, sex, nudity, drug use, violence, children in jeopardy).

The stars: Jeremy Blackman, Tom Cruise, Philip Baker Hall, Philip Seymour Hoffman, William H. Macy, Julianne Moore, John C. Reilly, Jason Robards, Melora Walters.

Behind the scenes: Written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. Produced by Joanne Sellar. Released by New Line Cinema.

Running time: Three hours, nine minutes.

Playing: AMC Century 14, Century City; Beverly Connection, West Hollywood; Galaxy, Hollywood.

Our rating: Four stars.