The curious return of Joaquin Phoenix

In theaters Friday: Arbitrage, Finding Nemo 3D, The Master, Resident Evil: Retribution
New on Blu-ray/DVD: Lola Versus, Your Sister’s Sister, Snow White and the Huntsman

It was just a few years ago that everyone thought Joaquin Phoenix was insane. A few bizarre non sequiturs on the red carpet soon turned into full-blown crazy town as the formerly private and seemingly reserved actor grew a bushy beard, turned in a series of detached talk show appearances and launched a new career as something resembling a gangster rapper spitting a lethargic brand of confused white guy jibber jabber. Of course, this troubling dissent turned out to be little more than shenanigans perpetrated for I’m Still Here, a self-indulgent conceptual art “documentary” that would have made Andy Kaufman do a spit-take. But if an Oscar-nominated actor is going to spend a year acting crazy, he can’t be totally sane either, right? Fans are still wondering.

Looking back, Phoenix’s first hiatus from acting came after the 1991 death of older brother River Phoenix who suffered a drug overdose at The Viper Room in Los Angeles. Phoenix actually made the 9-1-1 call reporting his brother’s collapse that was later broadcast on television and radio. The headline-grabbing tragedy marked a dark delineation between Phoenix’s earlier, more family-friendly “child actor” career (SpaceCamp, Parenthood) and the much darker and more explorative roles he would soon take in the mid-1990s and beyond (To Die For, 8MM and, most famously, Gladiator).

Of course Gladiator launched Phoenix into the main stream, which he capitalized on in two popular M. Night Shyamalan pictures—Signs and The Village—and the big budget 9/11 drama Ladder 49 before earning his second Oscar nomination for his spot-on turn as Johnny Cash in Walk the Line. All of which were excellent, unique performances, but taken collectively they feel somewhat slight, as if Phoenix has much more to show and even greater success in the upcoming third chapter of his career.

This Friday, Phoenix makes his return to traditional cinema with his first dramatic role in a major motion picture in nearly 5 years. Director P.T. Anderson’s mysterious mid-Century drama The Master is the first legitimate Best Picture contender to be released in 2012, and it follows Phoenix as an ex-Navy man back home and adrift in a post-War malaise fueled by his addiction to alcohol and women and the overbearing feeling that his life lack’s purpose.

There is certainly a parallel here between the role and Phoenix’s lost I’m Still Here years (no matter how much of it was staged). In The Master, Phoenix’s character is taken in by an L. Ron Hubbard-esque writer and launches his own Scientology-like religion and woos Phoenix into an uncomfortable position under his wing.

Early reports suggest that Phoenix is in line for more accolades with this bold return, and though he’s never been one to overload his schedule with projects, there are already whispers of what may be next for the idiosyncratic performer. He’s rumored to be taking a key role in James Franco’s adaptation of William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying—a notion that does make sense given Franco’s recent River Phoenix tribute My Own Private River—but first up is a supporting role opposite Jeremy Renner and Marion Cotillard in James Grey’s new, still untitled magician project. Phoenix has appeared in each of Grey’s three previous films: The Yards, We Own the Night, and Two Lovers, Phoenix’s last pre-rap career screen performance, and a worthy loner drama gem co-staring an outside-the-box Gwyneth Paltrow.

Where Phoenix’s muse goes from here is anyone’s guess, but now that he’s back in the game with a legit Oscar-contender, the only thing standing in the way of the actor becoming an iconic screen presence of his generation—not unlike Daniel Day-Lewis, his surefire competition for Best Actor as Abraham Lincoln this year—is a simple question: How much does he want it?