'There Will Be Blood' earns its Academy Award nods
By Nick Knittel, Staff Writer
February 1, 2008 | 8 p.m.
At close to three hours, “There Will Be Blood,” Paul Thomas Anderson's intimate epic of greed, faith and ambition, is a powerful, extraordinary piece of cinema. It also tells a parable of fortune and the darkness that often follows close behind.
As the film begins, we're introduced to Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis), a former coal prospector turned oil man who leads a solitary and plain life. After a mining accident claims a drilling partner, Plainview takes the man's infant son and raises him as his own, christening him H.W. Plainview (Dillon Freasier) and making him his only business partner.
H.W. is the only semblance of family Plainview has, or needs, and it isn't long before H.W. is as silent and brooding as his foster father appears to be. The two stumble upon a ranch in southern California where oil is rumored to be seeping from the ground, and Plainview's quest for land drives him to Eli Sunday (Paul Dano), a local, young preacher whose solipsistic evangelicalism runs parallel to Plainview's own. From the first gaze these two share, an understanding is passed between them, a sort of shared outlook and promise of confrontation to come that cannot be stopped, leading to the prophetic words of the film's title.
Anderson, the young, visionary director of “Magnolia” and “Punch-Drunk Love,” makes something of a departure here, loosely adapting “There Will Be Blood” from Upton Sinclair’s 1927 novel “Oil!” and managing to create a picture of contemporary scope despite the story’s historical background.
Those eager for some sort of modern-day allegory on our country’s quest for oil may come back disappointed, however. The film looks more toward the individual cost of humanity that such an empire can bring rather than any hot-button sociopolitical issues.
It is this human toll that becomes so fascinating for the viewer, and in turn, makes Day-Lewis’ performance such a pivotal one. It is hard to describe the joy of watching such a fantastic actor rip into the material, and his creation of Daniel Plainview becomes more mesmerizing with each passing scene.
Plainview is not evil necessarily but is sociopathic and exacting in his ways. The competition inside drives him to not only beat his adversary but to destroy him, to leave him bloody and broken on the floor. While you will not want to root for him, it becomes a matter of morbid curiosity. The feeling of second-guessing, the "there-is-no-way-he-just-did-that" kind of feeling, is what pushes everything forward.
Underlying much of the film is Radiohead guitarist Jonny Greenwood’s score. The haunting strings cast an ominous glow over the preceding events and the jarring, off-kilter presentation works well with the contrasting order of Anderson’s cinematography.
“There Will Be Blood” is currently leading the Academy Awards pack along with “No Country for Old Men,” both films exemplifying the same sort of quasi-Western renaissance that has Hollywood captivated. Its nominations include Best Picture, Best Actor (Day-Lewis) and Best Director. As the credits roll, it is easy to see why. “There Will Be Blood” is a flat-out amazing piece of work, solidifying Anderson as a true craftsman of film and Day-Lewis as a virtuoso performer.
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Speakeasy Rating: A+
Running Time: 158 minutes
MPAA Rating: Rated R for some violence