I finally saw There will be Blood, (B-) and I can say this movie is a bit overrated. It's not bad, just disappointing. I should preface this review by pointing out I'm not a big fan of Paul Thomas Anderson as a filmmaker. He's been compared to Stanley Kubrick, and I'd agree. Not that that's a good thing, mind you. Like Kubrick in his later films, Anderson tends to set up his scenes in very formal, very static images. His films aren't bad, just really stiff.
It's about a turn-of-the-century oilman named Daniel Plainview, and how his drive for wealth and power in California drives him insane. In that regard, it's been compared with Citizen Kane. Though I'd say it's got more in common with Raging Bull. Both movies are essentially character studies of men who's reach exceed their grasp. In 'Blood's case, Plainview's character has Anderson's view-and I suspect,- actor Daniel Day-Lewis's view stacked against him. For instance, when Plainview engages in spiteful and selfish behavior-like when he snubs the young minister Eli Sunday- we have no reason to understand where this streak comes from. I also don't quite buy the common view that Plainview adopts a dead co-workers boy as his own simply so he can pass himself off as a family man to the rubes he's buying the land out from under. (We can clearly see he harbours some genuine affection for the boy.)
I understand it's a rough adaptation of the first part of an Upton Sinclair novel, "Oil". So I'm assuming it's view of Plainview's capitalistic behavior is condemning. Problem being, given how labour was usually treated in the early 1900's, Plainview seems more like Major Barbara's Andrew Undershaft then one of Sinclair's plutocrats. (Compare and contrast, folks, this movie with John Sayles' Matewan...) There's no real connective tissue between scenes through the whole movie. So for instance, when Eli Sunday is pleading with an enraged Daniel in the movie's last scene how "We're old friends, Daniel!", you think to yourself, "Since when?" The main drive in the movie is the petty rivalry between Eli and Daniel, and I'm to assume it's because both men have figured each other out as a phony and a liar.
The main reason I took so long to see this movie is because I'm also not a big fan of Daniel Day-Lewis as an actor. However, I'd say that this is the best role he's taken on in a long time. Definitely better than his showy 'Bill the Butcher' in Gangs of New York. It's because the character is so repressed through the whole film, than when he lashes out at his deaf grown son and Eli towards the end, it's like watching a pipe burst. Here's the problem I have with Day-Lewis, the actor, though. In his recent roles, I'm reminded of Pauline Kael's comments on Dustin Hoffman in 'Rainman'. That is, he's an actor watching his character from an audience's point of view in order to modulate his performance, rather than just act. (I admire the role, but in a way I'd admire a clever piece of engineering...) Put it this way: If Day-Lewis has to spend two years researching a character who is all a front, to even his adopted son, the character has no ground. (I'm to assume the accident at the film's beginning that gave him his limp twisted him inside, but that's all I have to go on.)
American Gangster (C+) Standard slovenly-cop-vs.-dapper-gangster movie glossed up as only director Ridley Scott can. Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe play off each other okay, but the movie's problem is that there's no theme here, really. Well, there's several themes, but it's all so hazy, and I suspect, the racial implication is so timidly hinted at, that the movie loses a lot of its power. Is the movie saying that a black man can only succeed by co-opting Whitey's methods? Haven't we seen Russell Crowe's Ritchie Roberts-angel-with-a-dirty-face in far too many movies before this? (There's a sub-plot involving a custody battle with his ex-wife which adds nothing to the movie.) Is Washington's character Frank Lucas really supporting the community of Harlem by selling them heroin? (top-grade junk at lower prices, but still..) When the writing's on the wall, why doesn't the usually clever Lucas quit while he's ahead? He's too smart to let his pride override his common sense. I'm being a little harsh on the movie, I know. But given the talent at work here, I'm a little disappointed... Still, worth a look at least once.
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