PTA's next: There Will Be " The Master "

Well it's been a few years now since we last heard from Paul Thomas Anderson, the wunderkind director that was last Oscar nominated for his period opus There Will Be Blood, and now it looks that his next project, a religion based premise, will begin shooting this fall. So far there have been some scripts showing up online, but I did not try to read any or obtain them. I only know what the basic storyline is, and it's something to this effect...

The film focuses on a guy in his ’20s called Freddie ( Jeremy Renner ), who leaves the Navy after his appendix bursts. He swiftly becomes an alcoholic, and begins brewing his own beer, but when it almost kills an immigrant worker, he runs away to sea again, and falls under the spell of a man known as “Master” ( Philip Seymour Hoffman ), a family man who is also the leader of his own religion.

It seems from Internet rumor that the Hoffman character will be loosely based on a Ron L. Hubbard type leader and is going for that type of angle.

Rounding out the cast is Reece Witherspoon, Emma Stone, Amanda Seyfried, Thomas Jane, Deborah Ann Woll and long time PTA collaborator, Philip Baker Hall. Also rejoining Anderson from There Will Be Blood is DP Robert Elswit, who won the Oscar for his lensing on TWBB, and editor Dylan Tichenor, who also received a Oscar nod for that film.

The Master is looking for a 2011 release. I'm personally looking forward to it.