I admit to being biased against There Will Be Blood directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. When I sat down to watch, I braced myself for a 158-minute melodrama. Surprisingly, the movie entertained me in a bizarre way. Oilman Daniel Plainview is an unforgettable character. Portrayed by Daniel Day-Lewis, he’s so crazy he’s alluring. However, the truly surprising performance belongs to Paul Dano as Eli Sunday, a young preacher on a power trip he scared me as much as Lewis’s slimy oilman. The cinematography and soundtrack absorb the viewer into a story that revels in unrest.
Daniel Plainview has built his career wrenching minerals out of the earth. First a silver miner, he now travels with his son H.W (Dillon Freasier) buying up land and planting oil derricks. His newest lead brings him to Little Boston, an isolated community in Southern California. Plainview finds an ocean of oil under Abel Sunday’s ranch and guards it hungrily. Even mighty Standard Oil stays clear when he threatens to cut the throat of one of their executives. Yet it’s Abel’s teenage preacher-son Eli who could derail Plainview’s scheme. He presses Plainview to donate money to his Church along with buying the ranch. Plainview agrees just to get the contract signed, but never donates the cash. From then on they share mutual hatred and try to weasel advantages over the other.
There Will Be Blood is a very focused character study with sporadic action. Plainview claims almost every scene and our attention because his character is driven almost entirely by capitalism. He’s a workaholic who’s been so fixated on making money, it’s eroded his social skills. When he and H.W visit the Sunday ranch they pretend to be camping. He refuses the supplies Abel offers, claiming to want to rough it. This display of individualism masks deep paranoia. Plainview’s more complicated though because he seems to care for his son, workers and even a little girl. But he can suddenly turn heartless if they hold back his profits.
His biggest enemy is Eli Sunday, a fellow charlatan who’s meddling with his oil business. The teenager runs the Church of the Third Revelation and completely believes in faith, healing, and prophesy, but he seems more greedy than caring. After Plainview’s son is deafened in an accident, Eli coldly demands the money for expanding his church.
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