When it comes to talking about Paul Thomas Anderson’s adaptation of Thomas Pynchon’s “Inherent Vice,” the question is whether to hail the director for attempting the impossible or chide him for failing to accomplish the improbable. Anderson has managed to bring to life certain elements of Pynchon’s tale of private eye Doc Sportello (Joaquin Phoenix), set against the transitional period of 1970 in Los Angeles. The world is swinging from free love and mind-altering drugs to a more civilized and paranoid approach to the world and Sportello is caught like a paper boat in an eddy between all of the changes.