It’s always mindblowing to see a director break out of his shell. With There Will Be Blood, director Paul Thomas Anderson delivers what could very well be a new American classic, and does so without the elements he’s typically known for.
He had already abandoned his penchant for an ensemble cast in his last film, Punch-Drunk Love, in favor of an Adam Sandler starring vehicle—and here he abandons the long tracking shots and low-key, down-to-earth visual narratives in favor of something grander. The cuts are hard and the shots put you in awe. Even the score is electric and fierce, courtesy of Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood, and makes all the right bass thumps in the appropriately exciting scenes. There Will Be Blood is searing and monumental. It’s bigger than life. And it’s a triumphant mark for PTA that might (or should) get him an Oscar. With the arrival of this film, it’s tempting to see his previous efforts as merely experiments.
Though in Magnolia Anderson has created a large palette of misshapen characters that intertwine in a complex story, it’s There Will Be Blood that deserves to be called epic, even with a limited location and as little as two principal characters. One is Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis), a Texas prospector who stumbles into and becomes a ruthless oil businessman. The other is Paul Sunday (Paul Dano), a shrewd boy who sells information of the oil well under his family ranch to Daniel. Paul turns out to be the alter ego of Eli Sunday, a timid hopeful preacher who wants Daniel to pay for his upstart church. The film, set in the beginning of the 20th century, graphs the rocky relationship that the two must endure as they both build their separate empires. It also reveals their effects on family, like how Paul’s treatment of his family reveals his true nature, or how the loner Daniel gives in to the idea of family by building a relationship with an adopted son and a man claiming to be his brother. It\'s all part of the expose on greed, one of the film\'s strongest themes.
Seen through wider lens, There Will Be Blood is a story about America’s two powerhouse foundations: Capitalism and Christianity—easily recognizable from the names Plainview and Sunday. But even the names contain deception. Daniel tells people that he is forthcoming, but hides a lot of agendas and rakes his profit by lying. Paul claims to be a man of the cloth, but has questionable morals. That’s what makes this film such an American story, and by definition, a Western. It’s a story of men making it in the frontiers by taking what they can get and building a society.
The film juxtaposes how these two transform the American people in their own ways. The first time we hear Daniel speak (after an extended silent opening sequence), he is preaching to a crowd, selling them his drilling proposal. In exchange, the first time we meet Paul, he’s not a preacher, but a businessman selling land. The intertwining and symbiotic nature of the two opposing sides couldn\'t be more obvious. In Paul’s barren hometown where most of the film is set in, Daniel charms the whole town into letting him conduct his business, and in return he builds roads, schools and other necessities (it’s amazing how this tactic barely changed a century later). Paul also manages to sway the whole town into joining his church and believing whatever he says.
Daniel Plainview is a character as tall and impressive as Charles Foster Kane, just tip-toeing on the edge of being likable. There’s a shocking truth Daniel reveals near the ending about his son that makes you question whether you’ve been lied to throughout the movie or if he was lying to himself when he said it. That ambiguity makes him anything but plain, and it makes him a fascinating and memorable character. That’s not to say that the actor didn’t have a hand in that. Daniel Day-Lewis gives a fearsome performance, transforming completely into this complex and at times terrifying human being. Paul Dano also exceeds himself in this, using his weakness to really become slimy, shrilly and unlikable.
The film’s third act coda, set decades after the main story, sees the two men—or two foundations—squaring off for the last time. As a long dueling scene between two actors, it’s mesmerizing. As a metaphor, it tells you which side is weakened without the other, and which side prevails in the end. There Will Be Blood is a title full of promise. When religion and commerce are at odds, the outcome is ugly. The violent, bloody ending of this movie tells you that nothing is ever in plain view.
"There Will Be Blood" opens December 26, 2007 and is rated R. Drama. Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. Written by Paul Thomas Anderson, Upton Sinclair (novel). Starring Ciaran Hinds, Daniel Day Lewis, Kevin J OConnor, Paul Dano.
