Inherent Vice (2014)

In writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson's neo-noirish, stoner mystery-comedy and crime-drama - it was a convoluted, meandering sex and drug-filled tale (with themes of sex, money, and murder) about an alleged kidnapping plot. The shaggy-dog plot with an ensemble cast was based upon post-modern author Thomas Pynchon's 2009 novel of the same name. The film's style and ambiance recalled the Coen Brothers' The Big Lebowski (1998), and Robert Altman's The Long Goodbye (1973).

• the circuitous, dragged-out, atmospheric, eccentric drama with multiple mysteries and characters seen within a drug-swirling haze was set in the psychedelic free-love year of 1970 in Gordita Beach, a fictional town in scuzzy Los Angeles (SoCal); astrologer Sortilège (singer-songwriter Joanna Newsom) served as the film's narrator and the main protagonist's muse or spiritual guide
• the messy film followed continually-dazed, pot-smoking dope-head/hippie Larry "Doc" Sportello (Joaquin Phoenix), a private investigator or detective (with mutton-chop sideburns, resembling those of popular singer Neil Young at the time)
• in his messy beach house, "Doc" was briefly visited by his flower-child ex-girlfriend Shasta Fay Hepworth (34 year-old Katherine Waterston, daughter of actor Sam Waterston); she was a sexy, quasi-femme fatale vixen; she told him about her new lover and sugar daddy - wealthy and powerful real estate land developer/mogul and criminally-involved white supremacist Michael Z. "Mickey" Wolfmann (Eric Roberts); Mickey was married to conniving British-accented Sloane (Serena Scott Thomas) who also had a boyfriend/lover named Riggs (Andrew Simpson); the philandering Mickey, an eccentric Jewish millionaire (but with Nazi leanings), was known for his sleazy TV ad commercials
• Shasta briefly told "Doc" about how she hoped he would help prevent a plot by Mickey's wife Sloane and her lover Riggs to have her 'sugar-daddy' Mickey abducted and committed to an insane asylum; as she drove away, Can's "Vitamin C" played on the soundtrack
• the often-disoriented Doc soon became involved in three cases -- all linked to the alleged kidnapping-disappearance of his alluring, tanned, long-haired, and long-legged former girlfriend and to the missing "Mickey"
• "Doc" was also commissioned by Tariq Khalil (Michael Kenneth Williams), a member of a Black Panther-esque group called the Black Guerilla Family, to locate Glenn Charlock (Christopher Allen Nelson) who owed him money; Charlock was a known white supremacist and Aryan Brotherhood member, and one of Wolfmann's bodyguards
• during his search for Charlock, "Doc" visited one of Wolfmann's developed neighborhoods known as Channel View Estates, and found himself in a strip mall's Asian massage parlor (brothel) where he was propositioned by two workers named Jade (Hong Chau) and Bambi (Shannon Collis); after being knocked unconscious by a baseball bat from behind, "Doc" revived and found himself outside next to Charlock's dead body; it was hypothesized that "Doc" was so drug-addled and unaware that he might have killed Charlock
• considered a prime suspect, "Doc" was questioned in an LA police station by his combative and brutish rival with an oral fixation for frozen chocolate-covered bananas - hippie-hating LAPD Lt. Detective Christian F. "Bigfoot" Bjornsen (Josh Brolin), about Charlock's murder and the disappearances of Shasta and Mickey; it was later revealed that "Bigfoot" had a side job as an extra on a TV series police show "Adam-12"
• "Doc" was aided in his release from the LAPD and helped in subsequent searches by his attorney Sauncho Smilax, Esq. (Benicio Del Toro), and by his new lover, uptight Deputy DA Penny Kimball (Reese Witherspoon)
• in a related third case, "Doc" was also hired by ex-heroin addict Hope Harlingen (Jena Malone) to search for her missing husband - possibly-deceased; her husband was surf-music saxophone player Coy Harlingen (Owen Wilson); Coy was the first person to inform "Doc" about a shady organization known as "The Golden Fang" with a heroin-smuggling boat of the same name [Note: Coy was later revealed to be an underground police informant (with a wife and daughter) who was in hiding at a house on Topanga Canyon]
• "Doc" also received an apologetic phone call from Jade about how she had reluctantly set him up to be attacked and charged as a suspect (in Charlock's murder) at the massage parlor; she also warned him to beware of "The Golden Fang"; "Doc" also learned from his attorney Sauncho that the Golden Fang boat had last sailed with Shasta on board
• "Doc" finally crossed paths at the Wolfmann residence with Mickey's wife Sloane and her hunky lover/yoga instructor Riggs, he confirmed for himself that Shasta, his ex-girlfriend, had been one of their house-guests in the house of debauchery
• "Doc" also met in a downtown LA office (in a building shaped like a golden fang) with hedonistically-perverted, womanizing, drug-snorting dentist Dr. Rudy Blatnoyd (Martin Short); shortly later, Bigfoot informed "Doc" that the kinky Rudy was found dead from fang bites in his neck
• during his search, "Doc" finally crossed paths with Mickey at an asylum, controlled by a cult known as The Golden Fang; it was obvious that Mickey had been guilted and duped into joining the cult and giving away all of his money
• after her alleged disappearance, Doc was - to his surprise - greeted by Shasta in Los Angeles at his beach house - she wasn't missing, but had returned from a boat trip up north; she told how Mickey was now back with his wife
• in a noteworthy 8-minute nude scene (mostly a one-shot sequence), she suddenly appeared wearing puka shells around her naked chest (and body), gathered from a beach area; she seductively asked if he wanted a mind-controlled Charles Manson-chick: "What kinda girl do ya need, Doc? Maybe a thing for one of those Manson chicks?" Doc: "Whoa... it depends on what, uh, you sure you want to be doin' that?" (she was playing with herself, circling her finger on her breast's right nipple); she continued: "Submissive, brainwashed, horny little teeners who do exactly what you want before you even know what that is. You don't have to say a word outloud. They get it all by ESP. Your kind of chick, Doc?" Doc asked: "You're the one that's been stealin' my magazines?", to which she responded: "Now what would Charlie do?"
• Doc lit a joint, as she walked over and sat next to him, and began touching herself in the crotch, while stroking his right leg with her bare left foot. She provocatively spoke about her experiences with her powerful, animalistic lover Mickey, and how she was made to be submissive "Mickey - Mickey could have taught all you swingin' beach bums a thing or two. He was just so powerful. Sometimes he could almost make you feel invisible. Fast, brutal, not what you'd call a considerate lover ....It's so nice to be made to feel invisible that way sometimes....He'd bring me to lunch in Beverly Hills, his big hand wrapped around my bare arms steering me blind down those bright streets into some space where it was dark and cold. You couldn't smell any food - only alcohol. Tables full of them and I'll be drinking in a room that could have been any size, and they all knew Mickey. They wanted, some of them, to be Mickey. He might as well have been bringing me in on a leash. He kept me in those micro-mini-dresses, never allowing me to wear anything underneath, just offering me up to whoever wanted to stare, grab. Sometimes, he'd fix me up with some of his friends. And I'd have to do whatever they wanted."
• as she stretched her naked body over Doc's lap, literally draping herself over him - he asked: "Why are you telling me all this?" She responded provocatively - calling herself a "faithless little bitch": "Oh, I'm sorry, Doc. Do you want me to stop? If my girlfriend had run off to be the bought-and-sold whore of some scumbag developer, I'd just be so angry, I don't know what I'd do. Well, I'm even lying about that, I know what I'd do. If I had the faithless little bitch over my lap like this..."; she pushed him into violently spanking her, and then he had aggressive sex with her from behind. Afterwards, she said: "This doesn't mean we're back together." He replied: "Of course not."
• Shasta also described how she was brought along on a yacht trip up North as "inherent vice" -- "They told me I was precious cargo that couldn't be insured because of inherent vice"; she was referring to an insurance term implying a fundamental weakness or defect in an object that can cause deterioration, e.g., eggs that break, chocolate that melts, and glass that shatters
• through confidential files provided for him by assistant DA Penny, "Doc" learned that loan-shark Adrian Prussia (Peter McRobbie) had been paid by the LAPD to kill people (with his weapon of choice - a baseball bat) - and was the killer of Bigfoot's former partner, and the likely murderer of Wolfmann's bodyguard Charlock who had secret dealings with the secret organization known as "The Golden Fang" (also the name of the boat used to smuggle heroin into the country)
• "Doc" was himself abducted and drugged by Adrian Prussia and Adrian's partner - another Wolfmann bodyguard named Puck Beaverton (Keith Jardine); during an escape attempt, "Doc" killed both Adrian and Puck; Bigfoot admitted to "Doc" that he had planted heroin in his car to vengefully (and wrongfully) set him up; in exchange for Coy's freedom, the drugs were returned to The Golden Fang
• the many disappearances and deaths all led to clues suggesting that an international, underworld drug smuggling syndicate known as "The Golden Fang" was involved in a conspiracy with the LAPD and Bigfoot; everything was directly tied to the cases that Doc was trying to solve