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1. •  
     CommentAuthorAndre Navarro
   • CommentTimeMar 18th 2008 edited

    (1452.1)
   This has happened twice in my life: the first time was with Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket, which I didn't like in the first time. I loved the first half so much that the second half felt like an anticlimax and ruined the movie for me. Then I watched it again months later and I loved both halves and therefore loved the film. And now, PT Anderson's There Will Be Blood made this happen to me for the second time. In my first viewing of the film, I didn't like it. I watched it for a second time, and I didn't like it. Then I wrote a review and past the last weeks I've been pretty sure the movie sucks due to having watched it twice. But, still feeling like I was missing something, I watched it for a third time a month later.
   
   And I fucking loved it. Worse, every time I think about the film, it gets better. A post ago, I said I still thought "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" is better and Johnny Depp deserved the academy award more than Day-Lewis. Now, I consider "There Will Be Blood" just as good as "No Country for Old Men", "Sweeney Todd" and "The Assassination of Jesse James", and Johnny Depp might be my favorite actor, but this time Lewis indeed deserved to win.
   
   This is the story of Daniel Plainview, an oilman who's been building his empire since 1898. In 1911, Paul Sunday sells him an information: the land around Sunday's family's ranch has oil seeping from the ground. Plainview takes his adopted son (who doesn't know he's adopted), whom he calls H.W., and goes to check out the place. There, he confirms the oil and then buys the land in order to start drilling. Several factors make this become the hardest drilling operation in Plainview's life.
   
   Daniel Plainview is an incredibly interesting and iconic character, thanks in huge part to Lewis' work: notice Plainview's voice, pompous but determined, a voice that belongs to a man of vision and principles (which is how he wants to be seen). At the same time, his bowed posture reveals he's worked with a pickaxe for a long time to reach this position. And his eyes, one always wincing, the other wide open, make him look sharp and clever. And Lewis never loses track of all these mannerisms: he becomes Plainview. A man who'll do whatever's necessary to reach his goals, even use his son, H.W., as a way of gaining the sympathy of his customers (although he does love H.W.).
   
   Eli Sunday, Paul's brother, becomes Plainview's main obstacle. Leader of his own church, the Church of the Third Revelation, Sunday's sermons are pure fire and brimstone, and 99% of the community goes to them and likes the young man very much. Except, of course, for Plainview, whose hate for Sunday gradually grows due to the boy's arrogance and insistance that Plainview pay what he owes to the church (a deal he made with Sunday when he bought the land). Thanks to Paul Dano's brilliant performance (confirming the talent seen in his work in Little Miss Sunshine), the priest is, like Plainview, ambiguous. He acts like a man of God, but his lust for money and power over people is obvious.
   
   PT Anderson's script, based on Upton Sinclair's novel "Oil!", develops these fascinating characters well and introduces new situations constantly, which is vital since the film happens mostly in the same scenario. It's enormously interesting to see the early days of the oil industry and how it worked ("I believe that's called seepage. Doesn't necessarily means there's anything underneath.").
   
   But it's Anderson's direction that tells the story. Creating beautifully composed frames (with the help of director of photography Robert Elswit's excellent work, especially with shadows and blue lighting) and moving his camera with elegance, the director impresses with some long takes with no cuts (one of his trademarks) and his story-telling abilities. The first time Plainview speaks, it's a very close shot of his face, and only later we see his surroundings. And when Paul Sunday is walking up to meet Plainview (in the scene where Sunday ends up drenched in oil), Anderson focuses Plainview and his companions in a beautiful zoom. Anderson also creates some amazing scenes, like when the oil bursts from the ground unexpectedly, the baptism scene and, of course, the entire last thirty minutes of film (the ending is brilliant). Jonny Greenwood's soundtrack is perfect, well-composed but, more importantly, showing up when appropriate. The crescendo during the oil burst scene was a genius touch.
   
   This is a movie about Plainview but, overall, about the selfish nature of humanity and about cheating. About cheating other people and using other people in order to get what you want. And about cheating me into not liking it, only to eventually love it. As Tedcroland put it in my previous post, this movie has drunk my milkshake. Drunk it up.