There Will Be Blood

January 11, 2008

Rated: R Runtime: 158 min Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Daniel Day-Lewis’s Daniel Plainview is an early 1900s California oil tycoon who makes Charles Foster Kane look like a sniveling pansy crying about his sled.

THERE WILL BE BLOODIn this strange, intense movie, written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson (BOOGIE NIGHTS), the earth is a harsh, dangerous mistress, poised at any moment to reverse pressure on those trying to suck oil out of it and impale them with parts of a drill rig.

It’s a hard forge and a harder man aims to hammer it.

Early 1900s rural California is meticulously recreated, a barren landscape, virtually devoid of women.

Plainview is an oil seller, but a snake oil salesman. Every word he speaks is a carefully considered brick in a wall of scamming. Every conversation has coiled-up violence behind it. More Machiavellian than Machiavelli seems to be his motto.

He’s not a people person, because he hates people. All people. But at least initially he’s pretty good at faking it, bringing along his small son (he claims to be a widower) to sales pitches because people can’t resist a cute kid, and a puppy couldn’t do chores.

He buys up all the land in a small California town and finds his only opposition is a young fire-and-brimstone minister.

This is a better performance than a movie, but it’s riveting. Almost certain to get an Oscar nomination. At times Daniel Day-Lewis seems to be channeling the John Huston character in CHINATOWN.

This isn’t really even a tale of greed, because money ultimately gives no pleasure to this man.

Strangely, at times I found myself rooting for the guy. There’s a malicious fun to be had in watching the gears turning in his head, as he finds ways to turn anything anyone says to him to his advantage.

To quote the villain in SUPERMAN III ostensibly quoting Genghis Khan, “It is not enough that I succeed. Everyone else must fail.”

Incidentally, the last Upton Sinclair novel adaptation was the 1967 Disney musical THE GNOME-MOBILE!

Popularity: 14% [?]

Posted by Mack Guffin | Filed Under 3 Stars, Daniel Day-Lewis, Dillon Freasier, Paul Franklin Dano, Theatrical 

Seen it? How many stars do you give it?

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Comments

4 Responses to “There Will Be Blood”

  1. There Will Be Blood : mediaforguys.com on January 11th, 2008 11:54 am

    [...] just turned in his review for There Will Be Blood and I love that opening line! This movie looks to be very interesting, but the subject matter and [...]

  2. Damien on January 12th, 2008 4:53 am

    Are you really saying that the “The Ten” and “White Noise 2″ are just as good as “There will be Blood?”

  3. Mack Guffin on January 12th, 2008 9:26 am

    Are you really saying that the “The Ten” and “White Noise 2″ are just as good as “There will be Blood?”

    Apples and oranges. When you’re grading movies from 1 to 5 stars, you’re not looking for infinite granularity.

    When I first started doing reviews here, I asked if we had half-stars, and the decision was, no, because once you give half-stars, you might as well be grading from 1 to 10. And I agree with that stance.

    Also, one has to decide; if you’d only give a 10 to a perfect movie, than probably almost every movie would fall short, except your half-dozen favorite movies from childhood, or the proverbial CITIZEN KANEs, or whatever.

    THERE WILL BE BLOOD is an amazing powerhouse performance by Daniel Day-Lewis. But overall the movie has uneven parts.

    THE TEN is a collection of comedy sketches. In rating from 1 to 5, I’m not rating whether the movie is as powerful an experience as THERE WILL BE BLOOD, it’s how well does it works as a comedy. The sketches detail 10 commandments, and about 6 of them are really funny, so that was a pretty easy way to value 3 out of 5.

    WHITE NOISE 2 is a horror movie, so it’s on a scale of how well it works as a horror movie, not whether it’s better or worse than Daniel Day-Lewis making an Oscar bid.

    Also, of course, this is a movie site called Movies For Guys. The greatest Chick Flick in the history of movies will probably not get a five here.

    My own wholly subjective take on 1 to 5 stars:

    1 star: Don’t see this movie, unless you want to play Mystery Science Theater 3000 with it.

    2 stars: Watch it on cable or network TV.

    3 stars: Worth a DVD rental or perhaps a matinee viewing.

    4 stars: Worth seeing in the theater at full price and perhaps owning on DVD.

    5 stars: Worth seeing in the theater and owning on DVD.

  4. John on January 12th, 2008 3:24 pm

    Very well said Mack.

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