Today’s breaking news about new cast members in Paul Thomas Anderson’s new film project, The Master, is very intriguing.
Variety reports that Fiona Dourif, daughter of Brad Dourif, has been cast as the follower of a religious leader.
Recent updates on Anderson’s project report that Anderson has “greatly overhauled” his original script. At first, the film was supposed to be a thinly veiled critique of Scientology. Now, though, Philip Seymour Hoffman is said to be playing “a man who returns after witnessing the horrors of WWII and tries to rediscover who he is in post-war America. He creates a belief system, something that catches on with other lost souls.”
Let’s put the Scientology connections aside for a moment. Doesn’t that synopsis remind you Wise Blood, the novel by Flannery O’Connor which was adapted into a film by John Huston… a film that starred Brad Dourif?
It will be interesting to consider any parallels and contrasts between the two stories: Wise Blood is also a story about a man who returns from war to create a belief system that catches on with a few lost souls.
It’s not the first time that Anderson’s work will have people thinking about O’Connor. Just Google their two names together and you’ll find plenty to read.