*plot spoilers ahead*
The opening of There Will Be Blood is a filthy, filthy scene. Yes, I mean that as a compliment. No, I don’t mean that in the usual way I call a movie scene filthy. Where it is also a compliment. You can almost feel and smell the dirt and grime, as you watch a man swing a pickaxe in a cramped underground mine. He will go to Whiterun or maybe Windhelm to smelt this ore, then use the metal to forge … never mind. Whenever I see lavender, I still think of tasting it and revealing “resist magic”. That temporary ladder built into the mine doesn’t look sturdy even before the dynamite blast. So it’s little surprise when a step breaks off and plunges the man to the bottom. He eventually comes to and climbs out of his almost tomb. I don’t think this made the film, but the script reveals that his only companion, a mule, has dropped dead. The man somehow pushes/drags his ore-laden cart and broken body back to town in 110 degree heat with no water. Maybe the phrase should be “stubborn as a Plainview”.
After healing up, cashing out, and reinventing himself as an oilman, we find Daniel Plainview holding court with a roomful of townsfolk. With gruff charisma, he forcefully explains why he’s the right man to tap their oil reserves and make them rich. Daniel Day-Lewis is simply fantastic in this role, from start to finish. He essentially locks up the Best Actor Oscar in this early scene. Standing with Daniel is H.W., his adopted son. Years ago, one of Daniel’s workers was killed in a horrible accident, so Daniel now raises H.W. and lies to kindly women about how his wife died in childbirth. How could you not trust this guy with your land and future wealth? And yet, Daniel seems to be as loving a father as a man like him can be. I don’t have kids, but I know it’s a great parenting move when Daniel entrusts H.W. with responsibilities, then praises him for doing a good job.
Daniel is approached by a young man named Paul Sunday with an exciting new opportunity. Paul wants cash for the location of his family’s oil-rich farmland. Though it’s clear that the money is less important than getting the hell away from his home. Daniel meets the rest of the Sunday clan, including the holy rolling patriarch and Paul’s preacher twin, Eli. Daniel Day-Lewis completely overshadows everyone, but I was impressed by Paul Dano’s performance. As Eli, he has to go back and forth between gentle and somewhat pathetic, and fiercely spitting hellfire. The scene where he angrily casts a “demon” out of a woman’s body and then throws it out the tent, is ridiculous but still mesmerizing.
The Daniel/Eli rivalry is one of the most delightful parts of the movie. It’s fun to watch two horrible people (he’s an angry, rapacious drunk; he’s a self-righteous, judgmental fraud) go at it. Okay, here’s the best example: Daniel plans to say a few words before the drilling starts. Eli asks to bless the well in front of everyone, because screw that “pray in private” crap. So Daniel gives a short speech about how the town will prosper, looks right at an expectant Eli, and … blesses the well himself. It would have been the easiest thing in the world to turn it over to Eli. Daniel can’t stand most people, true, but he knows how to be diplomatic to look good. He just hates Eli that much. The fun continues when the two men humiliate and slap the shit out of each other on the slapper’s turf. Daniel slaps Eli down into the mud while out in the field in front of his men. Eli gets revenge when Daniel has to get baptized for a business deal, slapping him on stage in front of his congregation, while berating him as a sinner and bad father. Bonus slaps to a terrible person are delivered by Eli to his father, though for the wrong reason. Papa Sunday gets slapped for leasing his land cheap, not for beating his daughter Mary when she wasn’t praying enough.
Daniel becomes extremely wealthy and builds a big beautiful house, like the one he envied as a boy. He never learned that the rich man who owned it was likely miserable. Daniel is in his natural drunken state when he gets a visit from his son. H.W. had been deafened in an accident as a child, and now he’s grown up and married to Mary Sunday. In a movie full of tragedy, anger and greed, their story is a lovely ray of light. H.W. and Mary became playmates soon after meeting. After the accident, H.W. was sent away to school and returned to Mary’s continued friendship. She learned the sign language he’d been taught, and then we see her signing their wedding vows to him. Now H.W. wants to start a family and a new oil business in Mexico. Daniel had made his share of mistakes as a father, but he tried to do his best by H.W. No more. Daniel mocks his deafness and denies he’s his son. H.W. leaves to be more of an actual success than his father ever was. Daniel is left alone with his butler in his massive estate. Yeah, I’m comparing it to Citizen Kane too.
But wait, we’ve got one more visit from Eli! He’s found success as a radio preacher (ugh) but has fallen on hard times. So he came to offer his in-law (does he not know Daniel disowned H.W.?) a business offer: drilling access to the Bandy ranch, the one property Daniel let slip away. Daniel’s too drunk and tired to slap Eli, but he can still humiliate him with ease. Daniel gets Eli to say his religious belief is a fraud, then lowers the boom: there’s no oil left to drill. Eli doesn’t understand, so Daniel composes a metaphor, something about drinks and a long straw and draining … it sounds better coming from him. I’ve said the only Paul Thomas Anderson movie I’ve seen is Boogie Nights. Now I’m being reminded of the classic scene at the drug dealer’s house, all extended tension and absurdity (“Sister Christian!”) until it explodes into violence. Daniel chases a begging Eli with a bowling pin, the house has a bowling alley BTW, before beating him to death with it. After that scene, Boogie Nights wrapped up with what happened to everyone. There Will Be Blood just ends. As good a way to end this memorable movie as any.
Thoughts:
- A promised “I Watched This…” article on a vote winner, seven months after the last one? It’s a Festivus miracle! And I guess Christmas is coming up. Also, I’ve switched to a work schedule that freed up a third day off. And I’m stuck at home cause it’s -25 degrees out with the wind chill. Yep, a miracle.
- For the second time in one of these features, a movie character lost his fortune in the 1929 stock market crash. And if it weren’t for him striking Rose, Cal from Titanic would be immeasurably better than Eli Sunday. I’ll take rich arrogant douche over scamming hellfire preacher any day. And I’m confident Cal saved at least one more person than Eli.
- Daniel’s half-brother Henry shows up, needing a job. He turns out to be a fraud who knew the real, now-dead Henry. Even if he took some advantage of Daniel (“thanks for buying all this booze, bro, now could I have some cash for this whore?), Faux-Henry was a hard worker and someone Daniel could confide in. I was hoping Daniel would show some mercy. He buried the corpse on the Bandy ranch.
- I picked the opening gif because it was the most famous fictional character to strike oil. But could Jed Clampett be any more different than Daniel? Jed was a decent, gentle man who loved all of his family. And can you imagine Daniel Plainview with a dog? An animal that eats your food in return for unconditional love and loyalty? Fuck that shit!
- H.W. is deafened during a show stopping action scene, where a gas blowout results in explosions and then fires, that send Daniel and all his men scrambling to contain the chaos. There’s a combination of fear for their lives, and excitement at how much oil must be in the ground. I was amazed. Nibbles was unimpressed.
- The only other Daniel Day-Lewis movie I’ve seen is The Last of the Mohicans. I remember it being a rip-roaring historical action film, with DDL passionately insisting that the lovely Madeleine Stowe remain alive no matter what happens. I also loved this skit from the son of the man who popularized Festivus, which made me laugh while capturing the movie’s tone pretty well. And is that Phil Hartman’s voice?
Next up is … a somewhat polarizing director best know for making money with other people’s ideas, now trying something of his own.
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