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Tuesday, Jul 08, 2008
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There Will Be Blood a glorious, staggering triumph |
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| There Will Be Blood a glorious, staggering triumph | |
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by Nick Ardizzone -
SGN Staff Writer THERE WILL BE BLOOD OPENING JANUARY 4 Halfway through P.T. Anderson's There Will Be Blood, I came to the realization that Anderson's brilliant, much-lauded earlier works - Boogie Nights, Magnolia and Punch-Drunk Love - were the results of a director stirring in his sleep. Up to now playing with themes as light as sex, love, and coincidence, Anderson has come of age with a grim and beautiful piece on capitalism, religion, and family; it's hard to believe this is the same director who once had all his characters (admittedly to masterful effect) simultaneously burst into an Aimee Mann singalong. The tone and feel of There Will Be Blood are what Scorsese strove for, and failed to achieve, in Gangs of New York. With this bold portrait of an oilman consumed by his reach, Anderson has emerged with a vital story as deep as the Mariana Trench and as thick and black as the oil which courses through this fantastic - even important - film. Daniel Day-Lewis is Daniel Plainview, a self-made oil tycoon in the early 1900s who buys towns in the American west for the rights to the oil lurking beneath them, which he drills for himself. Always at his side to temper his hard-bitten image is his young son, H.W. (Dillon Freaser), who Plainview took as his own after H.W.'s father was killed while working a well. When the pair finds a town rich with the promise of oil, they settle down to work the land and deal with the townspeople diplomatically. Plainview is a born gladhander and hides his contempt for the common man behind a broad smile, but he finds his patience wearing thin when he must appease deacon and faith healer Eli Sunday (Paul Dano). An oil derrick means wealth for the community, but it brings with it accidents, betrayals, and promises of revenge. This is absolutely Day-Lewis' movie - from the first frame to the last - and if his portrayal of Plainview were to falter, the movie would collapse under its own ponderous density. Incredibly, Day-Lewis gives a performance of such strength and entrancing finesse that there is scarcely room to breathe between scenes. He defines the term "powerhouse." With his son or talking to the townspeople, he has the crinkly-eyed charm and easy smile of Timothy Dalton, as smooth and rich as caramel. Left to his demons, he fades into the night, hunched and oil-soaked, his eyes glinting with cold excitement. A violence ripples just under Plainview's showman façade, and when he makes use of it, the results are terrifying. Eli Sunday, whose piety is matched only by his self-righteousness, draws more than his share of Plainview's ire, and the terrible anticipation of when and how the two will settle their differences crackles through their scenes. Paul Dano - looking for all the world like Cillian Murphy's little brother - infuses Eli with a weird, effeminate intensity. Neither character is a balm for the other's harshness, and when their paths cross they rub one another raw. Here the interplay of capitalism and religion is layered thick: When Plainview is asked to what faith he belongs, he answers with a glib, "I can't choose; I like them all," but Sunday can see through his quick answers and is determined not to let Plainview bluff his way out of the flock. The tension between Plainview's will, roaring like a furnace, and the sheer audacity that makes Sunday believe he can bring Plainview to his knees rises to a furious boil early on and holds the audience rapt in its unrelenting grasp. Setting the mood throughout There Will Be Blood is the masterful soundtrack - the expressive strings at times a puckish, scheming pizzicato, then suddenly dropping to a menacing drone, like the buzzing of flies. When Plainview's derrick hits a gusher, the percussion beats relentlessly, the heartbeat of the earth as it pumps oil through its punctured artery. The camerawork is lustrous, dark and dusty, and the taut framing manages to make even a shot of the sea tight and claustrophobic - nothing compared to the serene beauty of blue sky and clouds reflected in a pool of crude. Charges of overacting could certainly be leveled against Dano (and Day-Lewis, if one was shortsighted enough), but in light of the scope of the film, any lesser performance would be the thin, anemic gruel of another movie. These are huge characters; they have huge emotions. The only misstep here is to try and curtail the movie's giddy expanse; even with a running time of nearly three hours, the third act seems hurried. Plainview's turn as a reclusive old man - more Hughes than Hearst - feels shoehorned in, though it builds momentum into the glorious, guttural final scene, a climax worthy of the hours of tension which preceded it. P.T. Anderson has created a world so full and rich that seeing the credits roll is crushing. Day-Lewis delivers a performance that is distilled and concentrated to nearly intolerable purity. There Will Be Blood is exactly the sum of its parts: a vast, flawless epic, a cinematic feast, an absolute triumph. |
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