Actors: Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Dano
Director: Paul Thomas Anderson
Spoilers ahead - I will assume you've seen the movie.
I first saw There Will Be Blood in the theater in January of 2008, and ever since then I have been dying to see the film again. I came out of the movie thinking that the first 2 hours were some of the greatest ever committed to film, and that the final 30 minutes were a debacle that nearly spoiled the rest of it. After a second watch, I'm not so sure about that - the film is so heavily symbolic that despite the absurdities and suspension of disbelief we have to go through in the final act, they are necessary to complete the symbolism of the film.
Symbolism is always difficult to talk about because we tend to think of things in terms of what they ARE - i.e. use the word IS a lot - we have a hard time talking about the fact that symbolic things both are what they are, and represent other things at the same time. So were I to say, Daniel IS pure capitalism, he's also a character in the film who acts in a certain way, and so on. Let's just keep that in mind.
Daniel Plainview represents pure capitalism. In the first bit of the film, we see him elated over his discovery of valuable stuff even as he has severely injured himself - he rejects bodily pains and pleasures. We see him deceive some people, attempt to deceive others, all for profit.
Eli Sunday ostensibly represents pure religion. It is unclear to me whether he is a charlatan - Plainview certainly thinks so, but I'm not sure. Perhaps he is - perhaps his charlatanism is in the service of the Lord. We don't really see that, but we do see in the final scene that he is made to utter words he shouldn't, had he totally firm principles. Much more on the last scene later.
H.W. seems to me outside of this world, pulled by the dual forces, but symbolically he is deaf to them - they have little or no power over him. While we see that in his adult life, he is a capitalist and an oilman, he's also married to Eli's sister, and his final statement in the film mentions God. He is religious, but not overly so, and he is a capitalist, but not overly so. Both Eli and Daniel are celibate, he is not. He is seemingly averse to both their pitfalls.
The final scene represents capitalism's bloody triumph over religion - religion won't fight back, plus it needs capital to prosleytize and grow. Eli makes reference to his failure in business - perhaps he lacks the deceit to succeed. Daniel makes Eli like himself - he makes him lie in order to get his way - only to crush Eli because Eli has nothing to offer him.
I think we're supposed to see this playing out on the grand stage of America - that this final battle is Anderson's way of showing that religion and capitalism are competing forces and that capitalism has won the battle for our souls. Blessed is he who can ignore both. I'm not totally sure I agree with that - and if so, it's a rather commonly made point.
Regardless, everything else in the film is top-notch - the acting, the production, the writing. I still think it could've been better.
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Interesting observations about HW. I had neglected him in my post-film thoughts. It was a blessing, then, that he went deaf. Had he not, his balanced persona and values may have been thrown off by Daniel.
ReplyDeleteI found this film was amazing in it's pacing and the way it allows the viewer to examine and think a out what he sees. The frequent use of panning without dialogue and breaks from dialogue that are filled with the awesome soundtrack makes it easy to get absorbed.
I liked Daniel for his toughness and willngness to get down to brass tax, but I found Eli repugnant. They are supposed to be mirrors of each other in their respective, polarized realms, and yet something about the way Eli lied to people was much more offensive to me than the way Daniel lied to people.
One of the top films of the 00's.
When I saw this film I had a similar reaction that you did. I was amazed by the brilliant filmmaking, the incredible acting and the absence of having a moral point thrust in your face of the first two hours. And then the ending. There is no doubt the ending is powerful stuff. But like you, I was left with a bad taste in my mouth.
ReplyDeleteThe capitalism vs. religion thing has gotten a bit cliche at this point and the movie seems to attempt to boil things down to black and white and divide things into polar opposites.
Perhaps it's just where I am in my life but I really am a bit disappointed by that style. And I found it so strange that after doing a great job of avoiding that the entire movie, the last 30 minutes is completely defined by it.
I thought one of the finest scenes was when Daniel was in Eli's church, forced to call himself a sinner, and to confess to having abandoned his son. What I liked about it was that you could see that Daniel was actually feeling the guilt, was not just making a show of it for Eli.
ReplyDeleteWhat was remarkable about Daniel's character there was that he truly did recognize himself as a sinner, but that he truly did not desire forgiveness.
I also don't think that scene fits into the Daniel-as-symbol-of-capitalism scheme. Do you have a different reading of it?
You're right that the end didn't live up to the rest of the story, but I still thought it was easily the best movie of the year. I was very disappointed it didn't win Best Picture. I know, the Academy Awards suck and I shouldn't care, etc., but I still root for my favorites. Just like I'm still mad Don Mattingly didn't win MVP in 1986, even if he probably didn't deserve it.
ReplyDeletealso, you've got to see The White Ribbon, new Michael Haneke that's out right now.
ReplyDeletehey, glad to see the four regular commenters weigh in on this one. been a little tied up lately, haven't gotten a chance to respond.
ReplyDeletehunt:
i'm just not sure that eli was lying to people - i think that's your assumption. we know daniel lies to people, and we know daniel thinks that eli's lying to people.
rubeskies:
i don't know that the movie got so black and white at the end. it got over the top, sure. in fact, i thought it was kind of trying to say that while capitalism and religion are competing forces, they actually have quite a lot in common - eli says 'we're brothers' at the end more than once, and i think he says it while they're in little boston as well.
ian:
i never thought of it that way. it seemed like daniel used the opportunity to cathartically shout what he could not whisper. but also, right at the end, he says 'now i've got my pipeline'. so the whole time he's got to have that in mind - i don't know exactly where that fits in allegorically, you're right, but it makes a hell of a scene in the film anyway.
i've never seen a michael haenke film; the av club gave the white ribbon a great review. i'll have to check out something by him.
jtg:
not a no country for old men fan? that would be like winfield and mattingly going after the MVP, imo. i thought no country was better, and still do, even if it's really not that intellectual of a movie, it's just perfectly done.
I don't really know how to explain my feelings on No Country. It just seemed to be less than the sum of its parts. There was a lot I liked about it, and as a whole it was fine, but it didn't come together into a great movie for me and I can't really say why. Maybe my expectations were too high going in.
ReplyDeleteAs for Michael Haneke, try the original Funny Games.
I felt the same about No Country as well jtg. I don't know what is is but all three big movies from that year (No Country, There Will Be Blood, and Michael Clayton) all impressed me but I didn't particularly like any of them. The acting was all great, the cinematography was all great, I just didn't overly like them for some reason.
ReplyDeleteThat's not to say I'm unhappy I watched them or that I wasn't entertained. But I wouldn't want to watch a single one of them again. They were all missing that undefinable element that seperates the movies you really like from all of the well done movies. Even movies that aren't well done can have that quality. But for some reason, those 3 didn't have it for me.
But then again, I'm the only one who didn't hate Synechdoche so maybe I'm just weird.