There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007)

[TedW]

That's kinda where I'm at. But I foolishly threw my hat in the ring -- admittedly in a half-hearted fashion -- and now I have to come up with some kind of statement. Take my advice: resist the temptation.

[exte]

If this doesn't win every Oscar it could be nominated for they should just stop hosting them.

Set design, Day Lewis, and if they respect him enough, PTA finally. Would Haynes steal it from him, though?

I can't believe the budget for this film was only $25 million, according to IMDb. It looks like $100m, easily!

[David Ehrenstein]

Though I'm Not There is the superior film it doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell.

[Macintosh]

I can't believe the budget for this film was only $25 million, according to IMDb. It looks like $100m, easily!

Ok, so what would a $125 million dollar feature look like exactly?

[Oedipax]

Ok, so what would a $125 million dollar feature look like exactly?

A worthless piece of shit, more often than not.

[Jeff]

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.

I think a lot of folks are going to have those same issues with it. You're absolutely right about the tonal shift in the third act, and it is jarring, but for me it worked perfectly. I think the story reached its only logical terminus. Those shots of the ground being poked and prodded by the excavation equipment, the steady earthquake-induced seepage, the first sputters of crude from the new wells, and finally the dangerous violent explosions from the derricks are emblematic of Plainview and the story itself. This is the first film all year that I wished I could walk right back in to as soon as it was over.

[putney]

i highly reccomened reading michael nyman's "experimental music cage a and beyond"

Michael Nyman is a reactionary, although his music does function well in Greenaway's work.

It should be noted the book was published in 1974...
reactionary or not now, it has little bearing on his views in this book, which were very clearheaded, and offers much more documentation and on the spot reporting than almost any book about that era of music.

TedW's comment on orchestration is spot on the point, which is made all the clearer within the film when the brief Arvo Part section occurs. there is room for the image to breath and co-inhabit with music. it really stands out, or more to the point, it doesn't stand out as much (Anderson's taste for foregrounding the music in the mix, which worked in boogie nights and magnolia, i believe is a small miscalculation here, i feel....)

putney

[Kirkinson]

i highly reccomened reading michael nyman's "experimental music cage a and beyond"

Michael Nyman is a reactionary, although his music does function well in Greenaway's work.

I'm not going to comment on the issue of Greenwood's score until I've heard it in full and in the film, but I wanted to chime in just to second the recommendation of this very excellent book. If you're interested in the development of music in the latter half of the 20th century it's indispensable.

[Mise En Scene]

Keep in mind, I've only seen the TWBB trailer on the official site & clips on The Charlie Rose Show and Gangs of New York once years ago, but...

Does anyone find Day-Lewis's Daniel Plainview voice and facial gestures slightly similar to his performances as Bill "The Butcher" (if just superficially)?

I'm thinking specifically about his letter "s" pronunciation, register (?), and the upward flexing of his chin facial muslce/lip flex combo (best I could describe it).

[Cronenfly]

There's definitely some John Huston in there too.

[tavernier]

"Some" John Huston? He seemed to be channeling John and Walter Huston throughout the movie.

[Cronenfly]

"Some" John Huston? He seemed to be channeling John and Walter Huston throughout the movie.

Yeah, I wasn't quite vehement enough in likening his performance to the Hustons. It was the first thing that popped into my head when I saw the trailer (and seemed to for a lot of others as well).

[Jeff]

Anderson has mentioned in a couple of interviews that he sent Day-Lewis a couple of docs on Huston in preparation for the role.

[tavernier]

Anderson has mentioned in a couple of interviews that he sent Day-Lewis a couple of docs on Huston in preparation for the role.

Obviously Day-Lewis took those docs to heart.

[Polybius]

So we're off on another tour of PTA's Pastiche-O-Rama?

[Jeff]

So we're off on another tour of PTA's Pastiche-O-Rama?

Not at all. Though like all directors (and indeed all artists), he shows obvious influences, the work feels wholly original. And those who feel that Anderson's style has become repetitive will be in for a pleasant surprise. Even those who do not care for the film must admit that it is stylistically and thematically unlike anything else he has done before.

[Polybius]

Showing obvious influences and being a slave to them are two quite different things.

Even if he develops a new set of tropes, (and the absence of his usual company suggested that would be the case), that doesn't make him automatically more original.

I'll reserve judgment until I see this, but this guy has really worn my patience thin in the last few years.

[David Ehrenstein]

While it's obvious that Anderson reveres Treasure of the Sierra Madre, There Will Be Blood does not look sound or act like it in any way. Likewise Daniel Day Lewis' vocal inerpretation mutates (along with his character) throughout the course of the action. This is NOT a feature-length John Huston impersonation.

Are we clear now?

[exte]

Showing obvious influences and being a slave to them are two quite different things.

Even if he develops a new set of tropes, (and the absence of his usual company suggested that would be the case), that doesn't make him automatically more original.

I'll reserve judgment until I see this, but this guy has really worn my patience thin in the last few years.

Obviously, not...

[John Cope]

Armond's take.

Though predictably contrarian, there are, as usual, things in here that are probably pretty accurate and insightful and then there are the things that are slightly harder to get past...

Plainview is the most remarkable movie performance since Eddie Murphy's Norbit trifecta.

...at least without a hearty guffaw.

[Cold Bishop]

Plainview is the most remarkable movie performance since Eddie Murphy's Norbit trifecta.

...at least without a hearty guffaw.

It could be worse... this passage personally made me guffaw...

Plainview's robber-baron immorality... the way he cheats a family out of its oil-rich land, his cut-throat competitiveness and inability to express love do not represent the essence of American culture or industry.

Do people still believe that cut-throat competitiveness isn't a large part of American industry and culture?

[John Cope]

And this passage personally made me guffaw...

Plainview's robber-baron immorality... —the way he cheats a family out of its oil-rich land, his cut-throat competitiveness and inability to express love—do not represent the essence of American culture or industry.

Do people still believe that cut-throat competitiveness isn't a large part of American industry and culture?

I assume what he's trying to get at there is that to emphasize that aspect of culture at the expense of everything else would be just as illegitimate as to presume no such attitudes existed or were significantly influential.

[HerrSchreck]

I saw this tonight and imho it's one of the better films to come out of Hollywood over the past fifteen years. It really does flirt at times with being an all-cylinders turning masterpiece. If it falls a little short at times it's because DDL's accent begins a little confused, bleeding into his UK mannerism, then straightens itself out after a brief bit. But in a few early scenes the vocal concoction comes off as some weird Russel-Crowesque failed attempt at "american" (though in this case of course Vintage Powermonger Mythological HyperAmericana). An in a few early scenes I thought his delivery was just wooden, too concerned with the vocalizing to sound natural (similar to the way his performances lately have been extremely picketed into the grounds of Facial Mannerism/Manipulation).

Some might say that DDL is majorly feasting on every piece of scenery in every setup... and in a way that's true. But in this case his ambition in his part, the length he will go to craft a performance of blazing, raging intensity (he's really trying to grab DeNiro in his 70's - 80's prime by the hair and stick his fucking face in the toilet) interlocks in a mesmerizing way with the facts of life about the character he portrays. And here what often feels like Scene Eating is in reality Complete And Utter Nuclear Charisma, and Eyes Boiling With Intelligence. The cat has some pretty frightening eyes, like two burning marbles catching their own reflections in little pieces of raging, teary eyed light. You simply sit there mesmerized by the star power of this man, who, without that huge life-force boiling behind the eyes would in this part look like fucking Harry Reems in his gaunt alcoholic Crash Phase:



I think the ambition and intensity, and the lengths gone to to craft this performance, plugs perfectly into the raging vengeful ambition and intensity inherent in the character he's portraying. It's a supersonic star turn, you can't take your eyes off hi for a moment the same way you couldn't when Brando walked onscreen, even in a bad pic. In many cases, and in todays times of poofed out boyish male stars (utterly devoid of the old fashioned masculinity crafted on Lower East Side music halls & vaudeville & english shitholes of yesteryear), a man with a combination of rare instinct, talent, physical presence and blazing charisma will register as "scenery-chewing" whereas in reality he's simply a big talent glaring in contrast with a slackerboy-infested (or American Innocuous Idolified) wasteland of Hollywood talent pool.

Really-- I simply can't see how this film "clearly doesn't work", and without a hint of snobbishness I pity the person who missed the emotional and intellectual feast on display here in this dazzling piece of filmmaking.. it's utterly inspired. You missed out on a supersonically entertaining film demonstrating the raw power of the cinema-- power is the operative word. The film just assults you throwing off literal sparks with the opening shots of the swinging of a pickaxe blasting out lit-up shots of flying flint. It's a perfect representation of thepower of the mise en scene and the tour de force unfolding of the melodrama throughout the pastiche-episodic scipt. PTA obviously knew he was "on" before he shot a single scene, and that set of pickaxe whacks is an incredible distillation of the masterful power on display over the subsequent 2 hrs. Amazing subtlety, completely original mise en scene, deft use of humor and rage without ever hinting at authorial comment. Such brilliantly loose (yet never indulgent) dialog, as in ke the scene in the restaurant where he reconfronts the befuddled dude from Standard Oil in front of his son... or the dialog, hugely gesticulated, about the "milkshake", at the end. Not to mention Eli's blazing "healing" scenes in the church. It's a genuiine tour-de-force on the part of PTA, who in the past I couldn't give a rat's dip inna shitbowl about.

One thing I disagree w Ehrenstein about is the Murnau comparison. I saw hints of Huston, Ford, hell even Anthony Mann (extremely masculine sensibility here).. but I saw nothing of the hyperpainterly pictorialism & livid surfaces of Murnau in this. Thankfully this film was shot in a non-self-conscious style, with no self-celebration at all. Everything was sheer Impact-- not "image". There were some semi-painterly static shots i e that magic-hour shots of the derrick burning, with DDL & co sillouhetted in the foreground. But these just felt like "accidentally nice looking moments" rather than shots labored over in a, say, Storaro-type pictorialism. SOmetimes nature combines it's elements and looks incidentally very beautiful-- that's the kind of beauty on display in this film, it all felt very natural and unforced, and never overcomposed. ANd I saw none of FW Murnau's other (non-pictorial) sensibilities on display here either. This film was utterly without sentimentality and editorial comment-- to it's credit.

DDL sounds a lot more pleased with this film as "end product" than he did with Gangs of NY.

Dano talks about the flick, and getting real bowling balls thrown at his head.

[David Ehrenstein]

I thought of Murnau in that Both DDL and Paul Dano loom across the screen as figures of horror -- much in the way Henry Fonda does in Young Mr. Lincoln, as that seminal CdC collective essay points out. Murnau was highly influential on Ford, particularly in lighting and compositional style. Traces of both haunt There Will Be Blood.

DDL does "chew the scenery." but that's because Danile Plainview chews scenery -- and the people that go with it. I keep expecting him to become a cannibal. And in a sense he does.

[Polybius]

Showing obvious influences and being a slave to them are two quite different things.

Even if he develops a new set of tropes, (and the absence of his usual company suggested that would be the case), that doesn't make him automatically more original.

I'll reserve judgment until I see this, but this guy has really worn my patience thin in the last few years.

Obviously, not...

Oh, horseshit. I'm skeptical of the film, for reasons that I've mentioned (his poaching of Malick's people, which seems of a piece with his previous MO), but I'm not going to judge it fully until I see it. Anderson, himself, I can make a judgement on, at least on the basis of his other work. And that is where my patience is worn thin.