There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007)

[Lino]

How long is this movie?

[dadaistnun]

The Variety review says 158 minutes.

[David Ehrenstein]

Well I saw it last night and it's utterly superb. I have never been an Anderson fan. His previous films always struck me as camera movements in search of a story and characters -- but not all that interested in finding them. There Will Be Blood is something else entirely -- in a host of ways. Daniel Day Lewis hasn't been before the camera in awhile and not it's as if he'd been saving himself for this film. The character that he plays is so hateful and destructive as to make DeNiro's Jake La Motta in Raging Bull seem as warm and fuzzy as Barney. Neither he nor Anderson spares us a thing, making sure we can't possibly look away from this train wreck of a human being for a nanosecond.

Paul Dano is the real breakout here. We expect DDL to be terrific but I would never have suspected the very promising young man from Little Miss Sunshine had a performance like this in him.

All tech credits pro, especially Robert Elswit's cinematography. In a palette that's primarily black and brown he has discovered all manner of shadings. And Jonny Greenwood's score is one of the most radical -- and successful, ever. It's like Charlemagne Palestine ever-so-slightly "cued" to specific dramatic moments. Scary great.

I have no idea how this will fare critically, and it's commercial prospects are severely limited -- though it should do quite well overseas and recoup fairly easily. But I am really pleased to discover that Anderson isn't a mere cinematic showboat but a REAL filmmaker.

BTW, it's dedicated to Altman and MAN would he ever have been proud.

[exte]

Well I saw it last night and it's utterly superb.

Coming from you, I'm sold. I was already sold thirteen times on this movie, and on this board, that's all I need here. I will stop visiting this thread now until I finally see it, period.

[Antoine Doinel]

Great review David. And thanks for keeping any tasty details of the film out of it -- I'm trying to go in as fresh as possible. I'm glad to hear my speculation earlier in the thread about Paul Dano is correct. Just the brief bits of him in the trailer are absolutely great. And I'm also excited that Greenwood's score is as effective as I think it's going to be.

I didn't think I could anticipate this film any more than I already am, but your review put it over the top.

Love the new trailer and the thing that is really striking me is the shot composition by PTA seems to have taken a tremendous, astonishing leap forward and he was certainly no slouch on previous films. And God, I can't wait to see and hear Daniel Day Lewis chew the scenery with all his characters' humanity hating glory.

Jonny Greenwood and Paul Thomas Anderson discuss the soundtrack.

Wish I could have been there for the Judd Apatow moderated WGA screening.

Two songs from the soundtrack are now streaming here.

Teaser for national sneak preview.

[David Ehrenstein]

You're very welcome.

There's no real danger of "spoilers" because the plot, as such, is just one damned thing after another. It's a character portrait, and you can't get a grip on said character until the very end. Comparisons will be made with Days of Heaven I'm sure (for that burnished "look" if nothing else. But Anderson is not Malick. Days of Heaven was a romantic elegy -- a tale of "Paradise Lost." There's no romance in There Will Be Blood, and no Paradise. Just different antechambers of Hell on Earth. An entirely man-made Hell.

A fortiori, considering Sinclair's title in juxtaposition with Anderson's, it's obvious that the film has an exceedingly contemporary relevance.

[patrick]

Damn, I didn't realize that this was being released at the last possible moment to make an awards run, I'm not looking forward to having to wait. I haven't read or heard a single negative review from anyone who's seen the film.

[Banana #3]

TV Spot here and magazine article that pertains more to PTA than TWBB here.

Official site updated and a deleted scene.

[Awesome Welles]

Interesting deleted scene. I was fortunate enough to attend a preview screening on Friday and have been thinking about the film. The scene indeed does not spoil anything and treads ground the film already covers extensively. It is one of the best films I have seen this year but I can't help feeling that it wasn't what I expected though I don't know why.

The film shows greatly how Anderson has matured as an artist when his peers seem to be losing their touch. As is unsurprising Day-Lewis turns in a great performance and Paul Dano is wonderful and an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor won't be a surprise. Another easy contender is Johnny Greenwood who turns in a wonderful score, not only of wonderful musical compositions but sounds that jar (in a kind of Toru Takemitsu way) and complement the film beautifully. Robert Elswit's cinematography is wonderful utilising a palette of seventies earthy tones and interior scenes reminiscent of the darkness cloaked interior scenes of The Godfather.

Spoiler

I greatly enjoyed the film and the running time shoots by, my only problem was with the pacing of the film moving across times is fine to start with and very well measured as we are told we move from 1898 to 1902 to 1911 then suddenly in the last twenty five minutes we jump to 1927, I couldn't help but feel we needed more emotional connection for the jump and seemed to come because the film needed to wrap itself up. By the end of the film we find Daniel cooped up in his mansion alone with only servants by his side, estranged from his friends and family a la Charles Foster Kane, with which the film draws some parallels I feel as if we needed a moment to anticipate this jump and it isn't given.

Certain things in the film make me feel as if I need to see it again without any preoccupations of what I thought it was going to be and a huge expectation of it's greatness that said I still found it to be very enjoyable.

[David Ehrenstein]

I disagree with your observation about the ending. What we see at the end has always been there in his character all along. It took the course of the narrative to fully work it out. What's new and delightfully dramatic is his last line.

[Awesome Welles]

I agree with you, it is there the whole film, I think we can see that from the first scene. My problem was

Spoiler

not with the end but with the jump in time, the actual scene transition rather than the finale itself.

[kaujot]

I hate every person here who can talk about the ending.

[David Ehrenstein]

There Will be Blood has just swept the Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards for 2007.

Best Picture

Best Director

Best Actor

Best Production Design.

Sadly the great score lost out to the egregious Once, but you can't have everything I guess.

[jbeall]

I share the frustration of those who have to wait until the end of the month to see this. I'm really looking forward to it.

Here's the New Yorker's review.

[quote="David Denby"]The experience chronicled between [the film's beginning and end] is as astounding in its emotional force and as haunting and mysterious as anything seen in American movies in recent years. I'm not quite sure how it happened, but after making “Magnoliaâ€

[David Ehrenstein]

More like Murnau than Girffith or Ford.

[Jeff]

So far, I've heard the film compared to the work of Welles, Huston, Kubrick, Griffith, Ford, and Murnau. That's quite the gamut. I'm afraid the wild praise may be setting me up for disappointment.

[HerrSchreck]

You and me both... because I've been promptly dragged outa my Standard Hollywood Apathy for this one. Phenomenon happens 2 or 3 times a year for mass releases and usually ends predictably.

[jbeall]

I'm usually disappointed as well. Between now and then I'm going to try and tailor my expectations. I figure that if I can go in expecting Boogie Nights, I'll come out more than pleasantly surprised.

[Steven H]

I haven't seen the film, but I listened to the Greenwood soundtrack today and it's incredible. It definitely reminds me of Takemitsu's score for The Ceremony (Oshima), particularly the opening bits titled "Open Spaces" for what it's worth. I'm very excited about this one (and I'm not big on Anderson).

[souvenir]

Has anyone seen Tex Avery's "Billy Boy" cartoon about a goat that eats everything in sight? That's Daniel Day-Lewis here, devouring every last scene he's in (which is pretty much all of them) and making his performance inseparable from the whole of the movie. The film seems as technically perfect as it gets, but I have this lingering feeling that there are a lot of shades missing from the spectrum. It's long, absorbing and paced almost perfectly, but the lead performance becomes overwhelming to a large extent. I hope the Citizen Kane comparisons flame out quickly because this just doesn't have that same ambition thematically.

Those last twenty or so minutes didn't work for me at all. The tone completely shifts and it feels like a tacked-on epilogue. All the restraint Anderson had shown earlier explodes like a frog from the sky.

The score is incredible though, syncing up sounds and images in the same unlikely way as Morricone did for Leone, and Robert Elswit's cinematography is stunning.

I liked it, just not as much as I figure most people here will.

[chaddoli]

So far, I've heard the film compared to the work of Welles, Huston, Kubrick, Griffith, Ford, and Murnau. That's quite the gamut. I'm afraid the wild praise may be setting me up for disappointment.

Add Malick to that list.

I saw this tonight with PTA and DDL in attendance (with Julianne Moore in the row in front of me for good measure). I'm still digesting it, but it is certainly astounding. What exactly I love about it and what (if anything) I thought was missing is still alluding me.

[GoldenPilgrim]

I'm still digesting it, but it is certainly astounding. What exactly I love about it and what (if anything) I thought was missing is still alluding me.

I saw this tonight at a free screening (no DDL or PTA though), and I'm still taking it in too. It's not my favorite movie of the year, but good lord I loved it. It's by far my favorite P.T. Anderson. There are some really great moments (really, really, great moments), and Daniel Day Lewis deserves all the drool that he's going to get for his performance.

I did have a few problems with it though, and I'm curious how you guys in internetland feel about them. First off, I didn't like Paul Dano, sure he had his moments, but he was way too over the top for me. I'll admit that I already was not a fan going to the movie. Everyone seems to have loved his performance, is anyone else there with me?

Spoiler

Oh my god it felt so good to see him bludgeoned in the end

Secondly, I felt the whole uhhh...indictment...of the church was really 1-dimensional, sort of cheap. I'm not saying that that sort of thing doesn't exist (manipulation, greed), but good lord, its not all like that, not everyone who goes to church is a complete brainwashed zombie, but that's the only representation we get with the film. The payoff at the ending relied too heavily on that so it didn't entirely work for me (DDL's performance made the whole ending though).

And finally, I loved the all of the music on it's own, really really great score, I especially loved the music for the scene with the oil well fire, but about 15% of it didn't work for me along with the film, sure it was certainly good for some foreshadowing, but that 15% was really over powering and even distracting. I'm really anxious to see how everyone else feels once this hits theatres.

By the way, How gorgeous was that scene on the beach?! Does anyone know where that was filmed? It looks some some bits of beach just north of where I live.

[David Ehrenstein]

I couldn't disagree more. Paul Dano was perfection. There hasn't been anyone like him since Pierre Clementi.

[Awesome Welles]

I'm with Mr. Ehrenstein, Paul Dano was simply wonderful. I disagree with your points about the music, I don't think the score was very typical of most movie scores (which I hate) where a scene will use music to rouse excitement or add a sombre tone etc. (or as Wes Anderson and Mark Mothersbaugh wonderfully pastiche this in The Life Aquatic when Zissou et al take Shark Island - the music is rousing and full of action and the characters are a useless blundering lot - it's all so wonderfully ironic). As I mentioned in my previous post I found the music to be quite similar to the work of Toru Takemitsu, the way his music jolts the audience, creates something so incredibly organic that it doesn't seem as if it was tacked on to the movie in post production, the music works as one with the film as if emanating from the scenery or the characters themselves.

Also I don't agree with your sentiments about the Church, I have a feeling that around the time the film is set there were many new Christian denominations springing up across the land, Daniel's comments about being from the Church of the World seem to suggest he is evading settling with any one Church in order to no be in opposition to the Sunday family but also his eventual disdain for the Church is emblematic of his character's ethos which we see building from the beginning of the film and we see climax at the end of the film, as Mr. Ehrenstein commented, in that wonderful last line.

[GoldenPilgrim]

Also I don't agree with your sentiments about the Church, I have a feeling that around the time the film is set there were many new Christian denominations springing up across the land, Daniel's comments about being from the Church of the World seem to suggest he is evading settling with any one Church in order to no be in opposition to the Sunday family but also his eventual disdain for the Church is emblematic of his character's ethos which we see building from the beginning of the film and we see climax at the end of the film, as Mr. Ehrenstein commented, in that wonderful last line.

I see what you mean, and I don't entirely disagree with you, especially when you say, "his eventual disdain for the Church is emblematic of his character's ethos which we see building from the beginning of the film and we see climax at the end of the film..." But also, like I said, much of the pay off with that ending would come with

Spoiler

his defeat of Eli Sunday/His Church, which throughout the film had been painted as a bunch of zombies, Anderson's intent is clear, and I don't think he's won any argument with an unfair portrayal (but to Anderson's credit I don't think he thought he would win any arguments either as his character doing the arguing for him is the greediest and most insane person in the film)

And as far as the score goes, I'm glad it wasn't typical of most movie scores as well, that wasn't my problem with it, like I said earlier, I really loved the music, but there were just a few scenes where the music was distracting for me(that's my only gripe about the score), and others where the music couldn't have worked better (for the scene and toward the film as a whole).

But hey, I appreciate your feedback.