In My Top Twenty | There Will Be Blood (Two-Disc Special Collector's Edition)

An extraordinary American story | There Will Be Blood (Two-Disc Special Collector's Edition) | Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Dano

DVDs:


	• There Will Be Blood (Two-Disc Special Collector's Edition) Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Dano Paramount, 2008 average customer review:based on 338 reviews view larger image
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An Oily Citizen Kane

For a while, I thought the arc of this movie was going to parallel the classic "Citizen Kane" trajectory, with Daniel Day-Lewis' character rising from humble beginnings and snatched opportunities as an oil well rigger - to a hollow, rattling, rambling millionaire alone amidst his riches. However, just as I thought I had the character's conclusion pegged that way, the movie made another catapult into new territory.

Everything about this movie proceeds by jagged, akimbo grasshopper leaps, like the ones that might be made by the giant grasshopper-like well pumps that dominate the film's landscapes. "Blood" has a distinctive beat to its plot - just as its score has a distinctive beat marked by industrial clanks and crunches.

The plot is loosely based on Upton Sinclair's book, "Oil," exposing the greed and chicanery rampant in the oil mining industry. However where Sinclair's book made the protagonist's adversaries a consortium of industrialists - this movie made Lewis' main adversaries a group of religious fundamentalists. That was a daring choice, but it does give the action another dimension.

Paul Dano is superb as the two-faced religious leader - so smooth and passively faith-basted on the one hand - so much the raging tyrant on the other. However Daniel Day-Lewis brings in the tour de force performance as oilman extraordinaire. This is a memorable film on all scores.

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In My Top Twenty

Without giving a synopsis or saying my peace on what deeper meanings I thought the story was trying to convey, I would rather like to comment on how wonderfully unique the film is in terms of how it was shot, the selection of music as well as its use and most importantly the tone of horror that it presents. See, to me this is an ideal horror film, one that examines the dark side of human behavior, how selfishness, as in greed and envy particularly portrayed in this film, can make a monster of a person; as it was for characters Daniel Plainview and Eli Sunday. And a real horror film is not without shock value, not the sort that makes you physically ill like the Saw series or Hostel which are nothing more than pornographic torture made by people who should be locked up for their own good. No, true shock value is a tremendous feeling of suspense where you have a revelation. There Will Be Blood certainly has that and more.

I thought the music matched the horror theme exactly and was used appropriately throughout, both beautiful and sinister. The cinematography was unique because it was done in a style that we rarely see any more, where instead of quick shots or lots of camera movement, it was instead very slow and concentrated. The first fifteen to twenty minutes for example were very reminiscent to the opening of 2001: A Space Odyssey, those of you who have seen it. What tops off There Will Be Blood as being in my top twenty favorite films is because I love history, especially American history. And the film stands out among any other made covering this time period because it is a macabre perspective on American thirst for oil.

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An extraordinary American story

Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day Lewis), a man filled with hatred and disdain for the human race, spends his life sucking oil from the ground and amassing a fortune. His power and wealth allow him to look down on the rest of humanity, but cannot protect him from his own self-contempt.

Paul Thomas Anderson's epic film is a deeply cynical meditation on two forces that defined the rise of America, entrepreneurialism and religion. It features great performances and a magnificent evocation of the oil fields of the West during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. There are many fascinating aspects of this film, but the most interesting may be Plainview's lifelong enmity toward the charismatic preacher Eli Sunday (Paul Dano), whose flock represents for Plainview all that is gullible and foolish in people. The two men humiliate each other in several remarkable scenes, most notably the one in which Plainview is coerced into joining the church in order to gain some land rights; it's a tour de force performance from Day Lewis. Jonny Greenwood's extraordinary, unique soundtrack is unexpected but totally appropriate. I'm sure that this rich film will reward many repeat viewings.

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A Very Brilliant Daniel Day-Lewis

I was blown away by his performance. A Simple story of a man struggling to make a living without the support of a wife.... only a somewhat challenging child. What seems slow at first picks up the pace as new characters are introduced. It is then we get to see people's personalities evolve under changing circumstances. (The preacher man was a riot.)

Entertaining but not a truly great movie

This is an entertaining OK movie. Not one of the greats as many previous reviewers have written. I won't go through the story-line because others have done a good job on that. And yes the cinematography is beautiful. But I have two problems with this film. Firstly, the story itself. OK, two rival characters each tormented by their own obsessions set in an epic historical background. But so what? We've seen that stuff so many times before. It's what Hollywood's about. Which makes it too self-consciously an attempt at 'greatness.' And that's where it goes wrong. Foreign films don't make this mistake the way we do in America. They convey a message and then let the viewer decide whether the movie's great. It's like we're constantly being reminded "this is a great movie, guys." Secondly, I have a problem with Day Lewis himself and found the preacher more convincing. Day Lewis is too perfect. He's such a competent method actor that I found myself wondering - maybe one day we can programme a robot to act perfectly and we won't need actors. Like Meryl Streep. For me when you see a truly great actor perform not only must they be competent but they must seem human. Bogart plays hundreds of different characters convincingly but you somehow can see Bogart's soul shining through as well as the soul of the characters he acts. Day Lewis is a great vehicle but who is Day Lewis himself? Having seen many films of his I still don't know. It sounds strange but he's almost so good at acting that he seems empty himself.

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A sprawling epic of family faith power and oil THERE WILL BE BLOOD is set on the incendiary frontier of California s turn-of-the-century petroleum boom. The story chronicles the life and times of one Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis) who transforms himself from a down-and-out silver miner raising a son on his own into a self-made oil tycoon. When Plainview gets a mysterious tip-off that there s a little town out West where an ocean of oil is oozing out of the ground he heads with his son H.W. (Dillon Freasier) to take their chances in dust-worn Little Boston. In this hardscrabble town where the main excitement centers around the holy roller church of charismatic preac Eli Sunday (Paul Dano) Plainview and H.W. make their lucky strike. But even as the well raises all of their fortunes nothing will remain the same as conflicts escalate and every human value love hope community belief ambition and even the bond between father and son is imperiled by corruption deception and the flow of oil.System Requirements:Running Time: 158 minutesFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA/HISTORICAL EPIC Rating: R UPC: 097361325743 Manufacturer No: 132574

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