THERE WILL BE BLOOD

Film Opinion

Written and Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson
Adapted from OIL! by Upton Sinclair
With Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Dano, Dillon Freasier, Ciaran Hinds, Kevin J. O'Connor

Paul Thomas Anderson's latest film, THERE WILL BE BLOOD, is a powerful, haunting film driven by the incomparable Daniel Day-Lewis in the lead role. Proving that the best book-to-film adaptations draw on weak material, Anderson mined dramatic gold from Upton Sinclair's anti-capitalism novel, Oil!. Much of the film story reminded me of a John Steinbeck with Eugene O'Neill ending. The director's canvas is large, and he fills it with gorgeous imagery: a flaming oil tower, a muddied father holding his injured son, endless brown fields and then, suddenly, the sea. And, most surprisingly, vast expanses of blackness pierced by a fire-lit demon's head, or the reflections of a few bits of silver in the rock. So assured is Anderson with his imagery that there is only one line of dialogue -- "There she is. There she is." -- in the first twenty minutes of the film.

With all of that said, the film's soul is Daniel Day-Lewis. The actor delivers one of the greatest film performances I have ever seen in capturing the ambitious, ruthless, yet strangely loving entrepreneur, Daniel Plainview. Much has been written about his performance by critics elsewhere: his kabuki-inspired facial expressions, his deceptively reassuring voice, his ability to shift from joy to rage in the blink of an eye. For me, Plainview's pragmatic "rebirth" in Eli Sunday's church is the pinnacle of his mesmerizing turn. In that scene, Day-Lewis is alternately annoyed, embarrassed, enraged, ashamed and vengeful, and he allows all those emotions to pass across his face, indeed throughout his entire body, almost simultaneously. He is the true master of cinematic acting, but I did fault his performance near the end of the film. More on that in a bit.

Prior to this film, I was underwhelmed by Paul Thomas Anderson's work as a director and writer. In fact, I thought he was very overrated. Boogie Nights bored me. Magnolia irritated me because it rang false. I did enjoy Punch-Drunk Love, however. With this record, I was skeptical of the rave reviews for There Will Be Blood, but encouraged by those who said it was a departure for the film-maker.

At almost two and a half hours, Blood does drag at moments. The intriguing central conflict, oil man vs. prophet, practically disappears in the third quarter of the film. Perhaps the true conflict is man vs. self? The ending of the film, which takes place twenty years after the majority of the action, is bizarre and out of sync with the rest of the film. Sadly, after two-plus hours of following Daniel Plainview, I was suddenly reminded that I was watching an actor, albeit it a great one. I fault Anderson for this mostly, because he lets the story get out of hand. Plainview and Sunday mostly played subtle games of one-upmanship, but they go broad at the end. The brilliance of the first two hours of the film was that we could see the road that Plainview's ambition was taking him; actually seeing that end seemed unnecessary, and in fact detracted from the overall experience.

That being said, There Will Be Blood is one of the best films of 2007, and probably in the last few years. Though it is only playing in a few theaters, all cinemaphiles should seek it out. It must be seen on the big screen to be fully appreciated.

GRADE: A-