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| In the name of the lord and profit |
“Ladies and gentlemen, if I say I am an
oilman, you will agree. I am a family man. I run a family business. This is my
son and my partner, H.W. Plainview,” Daniel Plainview says.
The sound of a mattock chipping away at rock
is the first sound that greets you. A man is down in a pit swinging a mattock
hard into the hard rock and sparks fly. He finds what he’s looking for, silver.
For the first few minutes of this film, there is no dialogue but the picture
tells you all you need to know.
It is 1897 and we are slowly introduced to
Daniel Plainview, a man hard at work who will stop at nothing to succeed and
make the most money he can. We are then taken to 1902 where we find Daniel digging
for oil. After an unfortunate accident he adopts the son of one of the men who
worked for him. Cut to nine years later and Daniel is now a successful oilman.
He sells his oil business to locals as a family business with his son, H.W. Daniel Day Lewis plays Daniel Plainview a
shrewd businessman who is taking the oil business by storm at the turn of the
century when the business picked up. He is approached by a young man regarding
the prospect of oil in his hometown of Little Boston. He sets out to investigate
and this is where the story begins.
This is a strong unapologetic story about
oil, religion and family. Daniel Plainview is a businessman who cares more
about success than anything else. He meets a young man, Eli Sunday who happens
to be a priest in the local church. Eli (Paul Dano) is an extremist priest who
clashes with Daniel at every turn. This film is more about character than it is spectacle. Each scene is unsettling in the extreme nature of how it is
presented. Paul Thomas Anderson weaves a beautiful story with tension at each
moment keeping the audience guessing. A scene begins and you really cannot tell
how it will progress. It is difficult to make an unpredictable film and Paul
Thomas Anderson pulls it off with ease.
The acting in this film is wonderful, to say
the least. Daniel Day Lewis brings Daniel Plainview to life. He gives such a
gripping performance that throughout the film you really cannot figure out who
this man is. He plays a protagonist who we are not sure if we should root for.
He is something of an anti-hero who is so passionate in what he does that you
can’t help but respect him. Paul Dano gives a performance that will
anger Christians across the world playing an extremist priest who is more obsessed
with power than with preaching the gospel. This feels at points like a hopeless film
with two extremes; a power hungry priest and a violent businessman. The only
glimmer of hope is the young son of Daniel Plainview who cares about family and
is somewhat grounded in the ‘real world’ as opposed to his father and nemesis.
The cinematography in this film is
spectacular. This is to say that it fits in with all other aspects of the film
to hide or reveal certain character traits as the story progresses. At some
points the story has long single takes that make you feel as though you are
actually watching real events. It gives the audience a front row seat to the
life of these people in Little Boston. The music on the other hand gave a grand
orchestral motion to the film that I think to some degree distracted me from
the film itself. The music at several points led the story in anticipatory
tones. This I felt was an intrusion to the otherwise impeccably assembled film.
Also, I felt at times that the film had scenes that were not entirely needed
and thus made the film unfavourably long.
This is a beautiful film and would be
appreciated by audiences around the world. It is quite artsy yet moderately
commercial enough to attract a diverse demographics. The film is rated (R)
because of strong scenes of violence. Viewers under the age of 17 would require
to be accompanied by an adult. Otherwise, it was a wonderful film to watch.
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