Time Capsule Review: "There Will Be Blood"

I recently stumbled upon some reviews I did back in college for the La Salle Collegian. In the interest of condensing all of my reviews on this site, I've decided to upload them sporadically throughout the next few weeks. I've chosen not to update them, mostly because I like the concept of reviews as time capsules for how we feel about movies at the time we first see them.

Below is a review of There Will Be Blood, which I originally reviewed in January of 2008. It’s a masterful film with a towering performance and a number of memorable scenes and quotes. Reading the review now, it’s hard to believe I made no mention of milkshakes.

There Will Be Blood is a gorgeously shot film.

Paul Thomas Anderson loves to dazzle. As a director, he usually accomplishes this feat with interesting color saturations and long tracking shots. As a writer, he calls upon fantastic moments (i.e. frogs raining from the sky) or odd deus ex machina (i.e. little pianos). However, with There Will Be Blood, Anderson has turned a corner. Although he’s still a dazzler, the writer-director has (mostly) abandoned his parlor tricks, limiting himself to the bare essentials in creating a mesmerizing character study that ranks alongside Citizen Kane in terms of pure ambition and scope.

Interestingly enough, Anderson opens the film with his lone embellishment—a nearly wordless 15-minute stretch in which he convincingly establishes the turn of the century setting and the fervor for oil. Functioning as the movie’s prologue, the sequence introduces Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis) and surveys his ascent to success, so that by the time dialogue sets in and he proclaims, “Ladies and gentlemen, I am an oilman,” we know he’s not kidding.

Accompanied by his adopted son H.W. (Dillon Freasier), Plainview addresses these statements to a community that has discovered oil in its area. In trying to gain the people’s trust, Plainview realizes they have become too excitable, and he abandons them; they’re all wolves out for their fair share, and Plainview’s looking to deal with sheep.

By this point, Plainview is a successful man, with one strong strike paying him $5,000 a week and several other promising wells to boot. But it’s not enough for him, because he’s got a competition in him. He disdains paying for shipping and begrudges Standard Oil. He’s looking for a big score that will enable him to create his own oil empire so that he can, we later learn, retire from the society he hates with such fervor.

He eventually finds the ideal situation—an “ocean of oil” underneath the home of a bunch of sheep—but complications keep getting in the way. Some come on the business end—setbacks at the well and the invasive presence of Standard Oil—while others are more personal, like an accident at the oil field that leaves H.W. deaf or the arrival of long-lost brother Henry (Kevin J. O’Connor).

Despite all this, the biggest thorn in Plainview’s side continues to be the preacher Eli Sunday (an excellent Paul Dano), a self-righteous con-man who presents himself as a pious prophet. The interplay between these two emerges as a strong plot element, and also conjures themes of capitalism vs. religion.

However, through it all the backbone of the story remains that of a father and his son. Many critics are referring to Plainview as evil incarnate, and although I see the logic in this, I don’t buy it. The character that Day-Lewis and Anderson have created is too layered to be classified so easily. Plainview is a downright nasty guy, but he’s definitely more complex than the film’s most ardent critics are suggesting.

At times, he is shown to be tender with H.W. and then outright malicious; regretful for wrong treatment, while displaying a refusal to change. The relationship is drawn obtusely, and is left open to interpretation. My belief is that Plainview has feelings for H.W., but that he’s too emotionally retarded to act appropriately. The drive inside of him, the overwhelming hate he possesses, makes it impossible for him to do so. However, his desire for family (as seen in Plainview’s conversation with Henry) is evident.

For his part, Day-Lewis nails the intricacies of the role. Taking his memorable Bill the Butcher in Gangs of New York to the next stage, Day-Lewis disappears into the character to deliver one of the best performances of the decade. Whatever your feelings on the film, it’s hard to deny he’s a powerhouse. Although the film's perfect from top to bottom, Anderson’s greatest masterstroke was to get Day-Lewis into th role.

Everything about the film, from Anderson’s brilliant script to Robert Elswit’s photography, is spot on. That said, special mention should be made of Johnny Greenwood’s majestic score. Taking a break from his regular gig as lead guitarist for Radiohead, Greenwood has perfectly echoed Plainview’s soul with a score that is both classical in structure and yet refreshingly experimental and discordant.

There Will Be Blood is not for everyone. Although it’s far more accessible than some of the more recent big studio art films like Darren Aronofsky’s The Fountain, it will undoubtedly irk conventional moviegoers who are looking for a light, fun night at the movies. A+

Jake Gyllenhaal Shines in Thought-Provoking "Prisoners"

Jake Gyllenhaal brings the intensity in Prisoners.

Although commercials made it seem like a variation on the Taken formula, Prisoners is actually a pretty serious drama with a lot on its mind.

In general, it occupies the same playground as Gone Baby, Gone, another pulpy and thought-provoking crime thriller about an investigator’s dogged pursuit to solve a child abduction case. But there’s also a strong political thread that recalls Zero Dark Thirty in the way it forces viewers to consider the value of torture.

The film revolves around the reactions of two sets of parents (Hugh Jackman and Mario Bello and Terrence Howard and Viola Davis) when their little girls are abducted by an unknown villain. When a mentally unstable suspect (Paul Dano) emerges and the cops aren’t able to find suitable evidence to charge him, the Jackman character takes measures into his own hands. Each parent responds to his actions in a different way, serving as analogs for the differing ways people respond to the use of torture tactics.

To say much more about the plot would ruin the film, but I will say that it’s beautifully lensed by Roger Deakins and that, although quite long, it’s well paced and grippingly directed by director Denis Villeneuve. The film also closes with a perfect denouement, which is a rarity in movies and another way in which it echoes both Gone Baby, Gone and Zero Dark Thirty.

Jackman is great as the desperate dad driven to extreme measures, but it’s Jake Gyllenhaal as the cop on the case who steals the movie. Although his Detective Loki handles many of his early encounters with a practiced calm, there’s a coiled-spring intensity to him that’s emphasized by his twitchiness and constant blinking. This is a man with a past (there’s all those tattoos and one scene implies he’s the product of an abusive childhood), and while he’s instantly sympathetic, there’s an unsettling sense that the guy could just go off at any moment.

Loki is a great character, and like J.J. Gittes in Chinatown or Patrick Kensie in Gone Baby, Gone (I know, I keep bringing up that movie, but it’s so good), he’s a detective you want to see tackle other cases in other movies. That’s unlikely to happen, but there’s no denying that Gyllenhaal, often cast for gentle quirkiness, is a total revelation in the role. Even being a fan of his previous work, I wasn’t really prepared for what he brings to the table here. It’s easily a top five performances from 2013 in my book, even if it didn’t get treated that way during awards season.

There’s a high level of melodrama on display and the film has the type of circumstantial “everything fits together” web that often plagues crime dramas. For those reasons, not to mention its dark subject matter and general dreariness, Prisoners isn’t for everyone. However, I found it to be one of the better films from last year. Ultimately, the character work, ace tech aspects and thematic and tonal strengths of the movie outweigh any negatives. A-

Off-Beat "Ruby Sparks" Transcends Genre

Real-life couple Paul Dano and Zoe Kazan produce and star in

Ruby Sparks, which Kazan also wrote.

Ruby Sparks is a wonderfully complex and off-beat film that plays like a Charlie Kaufmanesque take on the Pygmalion myth. For a more modern entry point for the film, think Stranger Than Fiction, except darker and far less overtly commercial.

Cleverly scripted by actress Zoe Kazan, the film focuses on Calvin (Paul Dano), an antisocial novelist who writes a treatment for his dream girl Ruby Sparks (Kazan), only to later discover she’s become real. Others can see her and interact with her, and, besides Calvin’s brother Harry (subtle scene-stealer Chris Messina), no one, not even Ruby, knows she’s been manifested by Calvin’s mind.

The marketing for the film plays up the quirky romantic elements inherent in such a premise, while highlighting its connection to the crowd-pleasing Little Miss Sunshine (in addition to sharing Dano, both films were directed by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris). That’s all well and good, but the simplistic approach greatly misrepresents the film.

Chris Messina (right) brings a grounding presence to
the film as Calvin's brother Harry. 

Sure, Ruby Sparks starts out as an indie charmer, and it’s often reminiscent of bittersweet romantic comedies along the lines of (500) Days of Summer. But, there’s also a whole lot more going on here than one would first expect, and the film takes off in some unexpected directions that simultaneously call to mind works like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Frankenstein and Six Characters in Search of an Author.

Upon learning about Ruby, Harry astutely notes Calvin can tweak her in any way he wants. Calvin scoffs at the idea, saying he knows and loves everything about her, which makes sense since she’s his female ideal. However, when Ruby starts to flesh out and develop beyond the introverted Calvin’s comfort zone, the temptation for editing proves too great to ignore.

Ruby Sparks winds up making serious statements about the creative process and the way men idealize women. In doing the latter, it offers a critique of the much-discussed Manic Pixie Dream Girl, a stock construct Ruby initially seems to epitomize. But, as Harry tells Calvin, "quirky, messy women whose problems only make them endearing are not real" and "you haven't written a person, okay? You've written a girl."

Kazan is good all the way through, but gets a true showcase once Ruby starts to become her own person and Calvin begins rewriting. She runs the gamut of emotions in this thing, as Ruby oscillates from personality type to personality type culminating in a tour-de-force climax that's shocking in how far it journeys into darkness. 

Antonio Banderas must love dogs.

For his part, Dano is quite impressive. Although he can be overly mannered at times, he’s also an all-in performer who can excel in the right part. Real-life girlfriend Kazan gifts him a great one here. Calvin’s a complicated guy with a lot of issues, reminiscent of a modern-day Barton Fink in the way he’s equal parts timid introvert and smug egotist. And Dano bravely digs in here, matching his career-best turn in There Will Be Blood and simultaneously making Calvin both sympathetic and detestable.

The supporting cast is uniformly excellent, with Annette Bening, Antonio Banderas, Elliot Gould, and Steve Coogan offering great character moments from the sidelines. Banderas is particularly enjoyable as the hippy boyfriend of Calvin’s mom (Bening).

The film barely blipped on the radar when it first came out, but it’s a great achievement for all involved, particularly Kazan. The granddaughter of legendary filmmaker Elia Kazan, she does her family name proud by delivering a rich performance and emerging as a screenwriter with a strong voice and a real sense of character.

Not everything about the film is perfect. I wasn’t thrilled with the ending, partly because I thought it would be stronger if Calvin and Ruby had moved on and partly because it made me wonder too much about how he would explain this craziness to everyone else in his life who’ve already met Ruby. However, it’s not a make or break thing, and ultimately, when a film is this smart, emotionally affecting and thought-provoking, something like that seems like a mere quibble. A