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Okay, so I finally saw it... Sorry if there's already been a thread like this, but what'd you guys think?

I'd say that it's, indisputably, a pretty amazing film... However, after sleeping on it, I think i'd have to categorize it as a "(deeply) flawed masterpiece".. Don't get me wrong.. it was captivating, well acted, well directed, etc etc.. I just think the last 20-25 minutes are unnecessary and, ultimately, detract from the film I mean, it turns into the Aviator for no apparent reason.. What do we actually get out of this final segment?

Prior to the jump in time, Daniel has already killed a man (who, most people would agree, DID NOT deserve it), abandoned his helpless child, faked his way through baptism, renegged on his word, lied, cheated, and was consumed by greed (which led to the suffering and even a few deaths of most everybody around him), etc etc...

abandoning his son the second time around wasn't even as bad as the first.. HW was grown up with a wife and could take care of himself.. killing Eli wasn't as bad as killing his fake-brother because Eli was maliciously evil.. his fake-brother was just a half-ass conman..

and that's pretty much the problem i have with the ending... it can't be seen as a "descent into madness" if he's not actually topping himself in any way.. and i seriously doubt that it's supposed to be seen as a redemption... eli was evil--but it wasn't Daniel's place to beat him to death with a bowling pin..

so what was the reason for even showing the ending? to show that he's "still crazy"? wouldn't we have just assumed that anyway?

hell, i think i liked Daniel MORE at the end.. raving lunatics are much more fun to watch than brooding lunatics.. dancing around, shouting about milkshakes, eating ribs off the floor--all great.. and that bowling alley? nice!

but, surely, those entertaining quirks couldn't warrant an entire epilogue.....right?

thoughts?

I dunno where you are getting "descent into madness", to me it was a study on corruption not the gradual escalation of corruption. Its not like they ever tried to make him out as a good man at any point, from the start he was bad, greedy, and selfish, he would sell his own mother for a buck - that seemed pretty consistent to me.
The ending was just an ultimate irony on top of a disturbingly interesting story.

Flawed masterpiece isn't a bad way to describe, though I'd focus more on the "flawed" than the "masterpiece".

There's no denying that Daniel Day Lewis was amazing. Paul Dano was pretty great too, and the baptism scene is one of the most powerful in modern cinema. However, the last scene is a little too over-the-top. I was at the Irish premiere of the film and Day Lewis was present for a Q and A session, and he surprised me by admitting that most of the film was not rehearsed, that the actors just dove in. This gave the film a raw power, but also made it feel a little lost.

The story wasn't bad, but a little too simplistic for me. There just wasn't enough meat to warrent 2.5 hours. We got the idea that he's an evil dude half-way through the film, and I felt the film had little else to say besides that.

Also, the film is far too cynical for its own good. Absolutely everyone is treated with contempt. The boy is the exception, but he isn't even given a voice, literally, to sympathise with. You leave the film feeling a bitter as you do inspired. Even Kane had his final moment of redemption, a call to return to his state of innocence.

On a deeper level, I felt the film took too long to critique two of the easiest targets in life: Capitalism, and religion, and, to a certain extent, the combining of the two. Such an idea is about 30 years too late.

Stylistically, the film is superb at times. But in terms of music, I wasn't convinced. Greenwood's score felt like Ligeti should be getting royalty cheques (if he were still alive). And the intention for the score? It's hard to associate the music to the film. PTA obviously was trying to evoke a sense of discomfort to introduce each scene, though at times the music was a little to disturbingly abstract.

Overall, I felt that PTA was trying to develop his own cinematic voice, and this film was almost a step backwards. Most of the film evoked Kubrick, especially Barry Lyndon. But even LYndon had more heart than There Will Be Blood.

Don't get me wrong, it's a good film, but not as great as the critics have been saying. But it's worth watching just for Daniel Day Lewis.

becs wrote:

The ending was just an ultimate irony on top of a disturbingly interesting story.

In your wording, it appears you're kinda backing up what I said.. the ending seems tacked on or "on top" of an otherwise finished story..

well put, numbersix.. i thought of barry lyndon (one of my favorite movies of all time) several times during my viewing of TWBB.. however, i thought Lyndon is paced much more appropriately for the story its telling... Blood comes off as much more disjointed..

and you hit the nail on the head by saying that the music oftentimes had little connection to the film itself.. i enjoyed the music--but there were several scenes where the music did not convey what was happening on screen at all.. i mean, at some points we were getting the Psycho theme in our ears but we were staring at long brooding shots of desert wasteland.. i actually chuckled to myself a bit towards the beginning, wondering how funny it would be to rescore the entire first 10 minutes with happy-go-lucky music...

I hated the music, it was like they wanted to fill every bit with useless background soundtrack, and the movie would have been so much more powerful if they *used* the silence and allowed natural sound in rather than drowned it out.

numbersix_99 wrote:

Flawed masterpiece isn't a bad way to describe, though I'd focus more on the "flawed" than the "masterpiece".

There's no denying that Daniel Day Lewis was amazing. Paul Dano was pretty great too, and the baptism scene is one of the most powerful in modern cinema. However, the last scene is a little too over-the-top. I was at the Irish premiere of the film and Day Lewis was present for a Q and A session, and he surprised me by admitting that most of the film was not rehearsed, that the actors just dove in. This gave the film a raw power, but also made it feel a little lost.

The story wasn't bad, but a little too simplistic for me. There just wasn't enough meat to warrent 2.5 hours. We got the idea that he's an evil dude half-way through the film, and I felt the film had little else to say besides that.

Also, the film is far too cynical for its own good. Absolutely everyone is treated with contempt. The boy is the exception, but he isn't even given a voice, literally, to sympathise with. You leave the film feeling a bitter as you do inspired. Even Kane had his final moment of redemption, a call to return to his state of innocence.

On a deeper level, I felt the film took too long to critique two of the easiest targets in life: Capitalism, and religion.

Overall, I felt that PTA was trying to develop his own cinematic voice, and this film was almost a step backwards. Most of the film evoked Kubrick, especially Barry Lyndon. But even LYndon had more heart than There Will Be Blood.

Where do I start?

First, it's always risky to label anything, so to label this a "masterpiece" or "flawed" is already venturing into dangerous territory...which is appropriate considering the choices/risks Paul Thomas Anderson takes with this production.

"There Will Be Blood" is a wake-up call to cinema. No, it's not a resounding gong or clanging of cymbals, but a true-and-true voice coming through on-screen in Daniel Plainview (pun is intended). For someone (numbersix_99) to call this a step back from PTA's stylistic growth completely absurd. Watch "Punch Drunk Love" and you see PTA coming into his own. "Blood" represents a more fully realized character formation not by love and circumstance (as in "Punch..."), but greed and (most cinematic of all) hate, pure unadulterated hate.

So many times we want to dilute stories from what they are because we want a happy ending. If you've been taught screenwriting, you're taught to appeal to the ideals and create a complete character arc. In a way, "Blood" does this, only in the "other" direction. The film starts with no dialogue, showing Plainview's current state ("heavenly", notice the visual similarities to "Days of Heaven") and the joys of fatherhood, before he finds his passion. As the story progresses, everything valuable (established from those seminal first moments on-screen) are traded for being the best; with having the greed, selfless ambition and sacrifice of morals and family to obtain that.

The scene of the explosion with Plainview, Jr. losing his hearing is one of the most memorable in recent cinema history. That scene and the scenes following show Plainview, Sr. has slowly choosing his business over his child, and never really questioning himself for doing so. This is taboo in cinema because he is the main character and with as much screen time as he has, you don't want to "throw away audiences".

If you think that the film is "too cynical for its own good", then maybe you shouldn't see it. Maybe you should stick with "Juno" or wait until DVD so before the last scene you can pop it back in the red envelope and send that DVD back to Netflix, ending it the way you would intend.

Fact of the matter is, the point is that the movie isn't tackling capitalism, it isn't tackling religion. But, through both of those subjects you see a man willing to give up everything (i.e. family (son & any hopes for a wife), morality, religion, capitalism, and even the judicial laws that govern each man (by killing his "brother" and Eli).

The last scene is VERY important in that it is the final evidence of Plainview's transformation essentially into the devil. Yes, he has killed someone by this point, but it's a wayfarer masquerading as his long-lost brother. In the back woods, he knows that no one would find out the killing, seemingly because no one knows the man's name (not even him) and thus, the man doesn't exist. So, what is stopping him from killing the man for deceiving Plainview other than his own moral code? By killing that man, he trades his morality. Yes, we've seen some evidence of this already, but this is the most damning evidence of the trade.

So, when Eli grovels to Plainview in hopes of finding an old friend and support, Plainview makes Eli deny the only thing Eli stands for...his belief/religion. After Eli denies God, Plainview then berates him, beats him, then kills him. The difference is that with the butler coming in at the end and Plainview (old and feeble) not trying to escape, we can reasonably infer that Plainview is now trading his freedom (provided that he is convicted of murdering Eli later on). He is becoming God, essentially. He makes Eli deny God as Eli is coming to him (not God) for financial help. Rather than showing some transformation, Plainview cements his place in history as he takes Eli's dignity and life, trading his freedom, while showing his power over the (powers that govern the land) United States and the judicial system that states that men are not allowed to kill one another. Later, if Plainview is acquitted of the crime or if he is convicted and his freedom is taken away (subsequently spending the rest of his life in prison), Plainview, in his mind, still wins. He conquered the last man that doubted him, showing his power and authority over him, and subsequently, doing the very thing that only God is allowed, to take life. He's taken it before (from the wayfarer posing as his brother), but this time he knows and doesn't care if he is caught -- as his butler enters down the stairs (then, going to call the police or help him dispose of the body). At least, if his butler knows, to his butler, Plainview would have proven himself over Eli. But, that's not important, he wants to prove it to himself, Eli and God.

If you see the story as "simple" then you're either one of the most astute cinephiles in the world (presumably after having seen it only one time) or you didn't get the gist of the story.

"Blood" is incredible filmmaking because they know about the pessimism in the picture and it only makes it more fascinating because as a viewer, I want to see just how bad this man is.

Admit it, didn't you think Kane was a pussy(cat) after having lived his entire life like a punk, he waits until his deathbed to have an epiphany and realize his indiscretions. At least if Daniel Plainview was going to be evil, he had the audacity and tenacity to be consistent and to go into hell with a blaze of glory.

I've never seen a character like Daniel Plainview and I can assure you I probably will never again...which is a shame. See "There Will Be Blood", but know going into it its objectives and intent. It is a character study and it is not "Juno", meaning you will not want to make love with your significant other and snuggle during it or within at least 36 hours (minimal) after viewing.

By the way, you're sadly mistaken if you think that "Barry Lyndon" represents Stanley Kubrick's style. Please watch "The Shining", "2001", "A Clockwork Orange", "Eyes Wide Shut", "Dr. Stangelove", even "Lolita". Yes, "Lyndon" has some qualities of Kubrick, but they are much more subdued than in some of his other films.

Though, I will say "Lyndon" is one of my favorites of Kubrick, it's mainly because of the cinematography. But, it is laughable to compare a film with Ryan O'Neal is the lead to Daniel Day-Lewis.

The score is necessary to further induce the madness of the character. Yes, I wish Celine Dion was singing "Bathe Me (O Oily Tenderness)", as Daniel Plainview stands in slow-mo oil falling from the sky, as his deaf (mute) kid watches on, but I'd rather have a fully-developed story at the risk of not selling 20 million copies of the soundtrack.

Frisky.. not to belittle your opinions or your post, as it is very very thorough and well written, and an interesting analysis that is mostly spot on. However this paragraph is utter bollocks:

So, when Eli grovels to Plainview in hopes of finding an old friend and support, Plainview makes Eli deny the only thing Eli stands for...his belief/religion. After Eli denies God, Plainview then berates him, beats him, then kills him. The difference is that with the butler coming in at the end and Plainview (old and feeble) not trying to escape, we can reasonably infer that Plainview is now trading his freedom (provided that he is convicted of murdering Eli later on). He is becoming God, essentially. He makes Eli deny God as Eli is coming to him (not God) for financial help. Rather than showing some transformation, Plainview cements his place in history as he takes Eli's dignity and life, trading his freedom, while showing his power over the (powers that govern the land) United States and the judicial system that states that men are not allowed to kill one another. Later, if Plainview is acquitted of the crime or if he is convicted and his freedom is taken away (subsequently spending the rest of his life in prison), Plainview, in his mind, still wins. He conquered the last man that doubted him, showing his power and authority over him, and subsequently, doing the very thing that only God is allowed, to take life. He's taken it before (from the wayfarer posing as his brother), but this time he knows and doesn't care if he is caught -- as his butler enters down the stairs (then, going to call the police or help him dispose of the body). At least, if his butler knows, to his butler, Plainview would have proven himself over Eli. But, that's not important, he wants to prove it to himself, Eli and God.

Its because of thought processes like this that Tolkien had to write a disclaimer for his 2nd edition of LOTR that said "there is no Super Secret Hidden Meaning". Good god, man.

Why is there no "delete" option for duplicate posts >.<

becs:

"bollocks"? I had to look this one up. I'm from the Dirrty South, we just call it like it is.

I'm sorry if you don't agree, you don't need to. Heck, I don't want you to. I want to hear your opinion and analysis of the scene. But, you need to back it up. I'm a believer and though some have found some badness in the story, calling it an attack against "religion", the last scene means something a little different to me. Everything from the shot composition to the blocking (notice Plainview on the ground, like a child bored and done with his toy). He's exerted his power for the (possibly) last time. The music queue reinforces the irony of the situation -- cut to black.

numbersix_99 wanted understanding of the last scene and didn't see what I thought I am seeing from the film. I could be reading into it too much (probably am), but I'm trying to understand it.

There are differences between "Oil!" & "Blood" and the screen adaptation of "LOTR" and Tolkien's "LOTR". When you add visuals, music, actors, you are making subjective (not objective) claims and opinions. "There Will Be Blood" does a great job of being objective, but from the evidence provided, that is what I understood. If you don't agree, please support your opinion with evidence from the film. Let's hear it...

Frisky, your responses were well-written and thoughtful... But I think you're stuck in an endless loop of filmbabble... You say it's dangerous to label things, but then you go on to toss off descriptions like "a wake up call" and (shudder) "necessary"... You're adding way too much of your own speculation into what happens after the final shot... I'm not saying you shouldn't wonder about such things or that the story literally ENDS when the credits roll, but the director of a film shows the audience what they need to see, if there was anything more that was "necessary" to the plot, it would've been in the film...

I honestly don't see the transformation that you're attributing to the final scene... Killing Eli might've brought Daniel a great satisfaction (or, perhaps, in doing so he believed it would), but I disagree that it significantly changes his character... He had hit rock bottom long before this--in my opinion, PTA should have omitted this last segment due to redundancy or he should've better paced the film to match Daniel's progression...

The first three-quarters of the film center on the conflicts that arise between (and within) Daniel and Eli's town... But the final quarter acts as if we had been watching a biopic along the lines of the Aviator or Barry Lyndon (or, yes, Kane) all along...

We can banter about with the filmschool talk that never really goes anywhere and never really says anything (if you want to waste a solid couple hours, just ask a film student to explain Eraserhead), but I still haven't seen any solid defense/explanation of Blood's more apparent flaws... (that's right, i labeled)...

Anyway, just to reiterate, I thought it was a great film.. I just don't think it deserves to be called the best film of the year..

becs wrote:

Frisky.. not to belittle your opinions or your post, as it is very very thorough and well written, and an interesting analysis that is mostly spot on. However this paragraph is utter bollocks:

hahaha.. funny that we approached this in an almost identical way

friskytiger81 wrote:

By the way, you're sadly mistaken if you think that "Barry Lyndon" represents Stanley Kubrick's style. Please watch "The Shining", "2001", "A Clockwork Orange", "Eyes Wide Shut", "Dr. Stangelove", even "Lolita". Yes, "Lyndon" has some qualities of Kubrick, but they are much more subdued than in some of his other films.

I imagine if Kubrick were alive and bored enough to be reading FM message boards, he would most likely refute your claim that "Lyndon has SOME qualities of Kubrick"... I've seen all of Kubrick's work--as, I imagine, most FMers have--and Lyndon is PURE fuckin KUBRICK.. It may be grounded by certain rules that films like Clockwork Orange and 2001 did not need to adhere to--but nothing about Lyndon squelched or toned down Kubrick's style..

NSpannus:

What's with the language? Great, you've seen all of Kubrick's work. I've seen all of Dennis Dugan's work, so how 'bout we get together one day and watch "National Security" followed by "Spartacus".

I really don't understand the post you made. I'm okay with you refuting my claims (some that were called "bollocks"), but considering the title of the bulletin board post, "There Will be Blood: thoughts?", I really don't understand the backlash.

Are these boards only here so that film geeks can talk about how bad-ass the special effects in "Transformers" were? I mean, I'm fine with that, I just don't want to talk about that. When I see a bulletin board post asking for thoughts on a movie I respect, I thought I'd offer my insight.

spanner, can you please put a spoiler warning in the title.

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