Hard Eight

Paul Thomas Anderson must have taken mind steroids, or something. "Hard Eight" is Anderson's first feature-length film, a by-the-numbers flick about an experienced gambler who takes a struggling gambler under his wing, shows him some things, and then they face some conflict. It's okay. "The Cooler" covered similar terrain and was better. Yet, just one year later, Anderson made one of the best movies of all time ("Boogie Nights"), and then he went on to make one of the better films of the late '90s ("Magnolia") and one of the better films of 2007 ("There Will Be Blood"). There are no signs or flashes of his future brilliance in "Hard Eight." I don't know how else to explain the trajectory of his career, except for mind steroids.