Somewhere in the cloud of plot smoke that is “Inherent Vice” a suspect board is displayed, charting the lives that form an array of overlapping cabals, cliques and factions. It’s the opposite of revealing, only the squiggling emphasis around “Golden Fang” steering the audience anywhere near a story. Staring at that board with dope fiend private dick “Doc” Sportello is the experience of “Inherent Vice”: desperately random clues all pointing to sinister conclusions. “Inherent Vice” is not only a 70’s noir throwback, not just a Lebowskian dark comedy, but also the perfect conspiracy movie.

'Inherent Vice' Movie Review

“Inherent Vice” begins with Larry “Doc” Sportello (Joaquin Phoenix) at home in Gordita Beach. Ex-old lady Shasta reappears in his life, pointing him to a potential kidnapping of local real estate mogul Mickey Wolfman.

Then a lot happens.

'Inherent Vice' Movie Trailer

“Inherent Vice” puts on a zoned out pose, stepping to the viewer like Mr. Natural just before unleashing a flurry of plot points. Remarkably true to the Thomas Pynchon novel, the “Inherent Vice” movie captures the same sensation of overwhelming machinations just out of sight, over the next hill. “Inherent Vice” is a story about our paranoia, but also the subtle oppression of systems worthy of our paranoia: the sensation that even if we’re not being watched we are still swept up in the apparatus, subject to whims we can’t imagine. And though all the little conspiracy threads would seem to join up in the sky, somewhere high above the clouds, “Inherent Vice” never offers up a puppet-master.

'Inherent Vice' Movie "Paranoia" Trailer

That’s not to say “Inherent Vice” lacks an ending. By the time “Inherent Vice” has drawn to a close a sensation of both victimhood and hope has been achieved. In “Inherent Vice” the citizen is on the outs, separate from the real power, but stuck in a pen and prodded at-will by a collision of corporate, criminal, and political powers. We are their customers, their victims, and their fuel. How much you want to read “Inherent Vice” as the real world is a matter of personal belief, but the movie certainly provides enough to build a persecution complex. But where’s that promised hope? Find it where you can get it, “Inherent Vice” warns. Do the right thing, even if it's a small victory against omnipresent evil, because a consolation prize is the best Doc (or anyone) can manage without joining the conspiracy.

Still, “Inherent Vice” is not dour or serious.

Instead “Inherent Vice” is very funny. Joaquin Phoenix is a big part of that: his puzzled expressions, fuzzy intonations, and useless, scribbled notes will have you following his groove, not caring when a promising lead falls away and a new character pops up to huff Doc’s nitrous oxide and point us to a dockside lounge, sanatorium, or Ouija board.

While Phoenix carries the movie, Detective Christian “Bigfoot” Bjornsen, played by Josh Brolin as a self-aware fascist, is the most fun character in “Inherent Vice.” The scenes in “Inherent Vice between Bigfoot and Doc crackle, their friction letting off static shocks. Bigfoot’s nightshift invading late night TV as a commercial pitchman or featured extra are some of the funniest moments in “Inherent Vice,” exhibiting the Paul Thomas Anderson flair for low-budget parody not seen since his Philip Seymour Hoffman “Mattress Man Commercial.”

The rest of the cast is similarly fantastic, with Eric Roberts, Serena Scott Thomas, Maya Rudolph, Hong Chau, Jordan Christian Hearn, Benicio Del Toro, Reese Witherspoon, Martin Short, and Owen Wilson all getting their turn in the California sun of “Inherent Vice.” Special mention is owed to Katherine Waterston as Shasta, who kicks off the whole affair and gives “Inherent Vice” a performance that’s enigmatic and manipulative, balanced to keep the audience always teetering on her side no matter how coy her obfuscations get. Thanks to great characters and a fantastic script the emotional core of “Inherent Vice” feels vibrant, even as its human elements are nearly lost in conspiratorial smoke.

Which brings us to what must have been a large portion of the “Inherent Vice” script: the Joanna Newsom narration on which so much of the “Inherent Vice” tone depends. In any other hands the amount of voiceover in “Inherent Vice,” would be a disaster. But the combination of Thomas Pynchon’s novel wording, Paul Thomas Anderson’s judicious application, and Joanna Newsom’s spiffy delivery makes for some of the finest narration ever in a movie, always giving us much more than plot hole spackling and never stooping to private eye doggerel.

Inherent Vice Book Trailer Voiced by Thomas Pynchon

As a movie watching experience “Inherent Vice” feels very different than “The Master,” but shares its same contempt for form. Paced unlike anything you’ve ever experienced, the “Inherent Vice” sensation is always pleasant, like a long ride down the coast at sunset, with the perfect song on the radio. Thomas Pynchon may have been peddling the same humanist outrage against THE MAN since “The Crying of Lot 49,” but thanks to the cast and crew of “Inherent Vice” his message feels as alive and necessary as ever.