A masterfully crafted film that illustrates the greed of mankind

Rating: 10/10 (17 August 2019)

There Will Be Blood truly blew me away. After watching the Best Picture winner from the same year, No Country for Old Men, and being largely disappointed, I came into this ready to feel the same way again. But let me say, this film was far more deserving of Best Picture, and definitely should have won the award, as it is far and away the best film I have seen from 2007.
The film begins in 1898. Daniel Plainview is working in a silver mine. After finding silver ore, Plainview sells it and hires a crew and, after finding oil, becomes an oil man. When the father of an infant son dies in a drilling accident, Plainview takes the child as his own, eventually beginning to use him strategically to get a business advantage (claiming his is a "family business"). The film picks up in 1911, where Plainview is now doing quite well for himself in the oil business, and is tipped off about a place where there is a large amount of oil. Plainview buys the land from a reluctant family that had been living there and begins drilling for oil.
The story of the film mostly follows Daniel Plainview as a character, rather than the events around him. Key moments surrounding this oil drilling process are used as focal points where we key in on Plainview as a person. It is overall a deep character study of this savvy, manipulative businessman. The farther we get through the film, the more we see his descent into madness. From the very beginning of the film, we can see that Plainview's moral compass is already quite skewed, but the more time we spend with him, the more we see just how awful he really can be. There are always things going on around Plainview, whether it be drilling accidents or his encounters with Eli Sunday, the prayer leader of the small community where Plainview is drilling, but at the center of it all is Plainview as he becomes more and more morally corrupt.
Now, there are many movies about mentally unstable people descending into complete madness, but I don't think I've ever seen any that are quite like this. This is one of the freshest, most original films I've seen in a while, even though it was made over 10 years ago. It's quite rare to find films like this, that are just completely new ideas on how to tell stories, so I think it's worth acknowledging the originality of this movie.
One thing I found very interesting about this film was the way they portrayed the character of Eli Sunday. At the beginning of the movie, he just appears to be the stereotypical "good Christian boy" that is trying to support his Church and his faith. However, as the film progresses, we see more and more of who he really is, to the point where it is implied that he is nearly as morally corrupt as Plainview. For a moment early on in the film, I got worried that it might start portraying religion as the savior of all things. Thankfully, I found it to be much more intelligent and thought-provoking than the ridiculous propaganda it could have become. This is a movie that seriously questions religion, but not in a direct way. Instead, we see little details sprinkled throughout that, when thoughtfully considered, seem to be depicting the greed and corruption that exists in the world of religion, just as in the business world. This is a very bold and gutsy decision that may offend many people, but that I have a good deal of appreciation for, because deep down, we all know this can be very real. This is a film that doesn't sugarcoat what the world is like, doesn't tell us what we want to hear. There are deep messages in this film about the greed and lust for power that exists in all of mankind, including in those leaders that we may personally look up to and admire. This raw, painfully real approach to portraying the nature of evil in the human race is one of the many things that make this an incredibly intriguing film.
Besides Eli and, of course, Plainview, there isn't much else noteworthy from the area of character development. Most of the other characters in the film are just there as means of illustrating how bad Plainview can be, or helping his character development move along. This is a very focused movie, and rarely does it shift its focus from the character of Daniel Plainview. I don't consider this a bad thing, as this was a story mainly about this one man, but some may not enjoy this decision. I instead found this to be a very smart move, as having too many characters being developed would have forced the film to wander into places it had no reason to go to. So, this was yet another smart filmmaking move.
Now, throughout this review, I have been pointing out some of the many great decisions made by director Paul Thomas Anderson. His masterful direction of this film is so important to the greatness of the final product. Like I mentioned before, his ability to focus in on one character, and one character alone, and tell a whole story that is both interesting and entertaining is unbelievable. He takes this one character and is able to tell a relevant story portraying the universal greed and corruption of all of mankind. The pace is perhaps a bit slow, but doesn't ever feel like it due to the way every scene has some sort of purpose or connection to the overall story that is being told. The film never wanders or feeds us useless information, instead always staying committed to what it's trying to do. Using all of these storytelling techniques and strategies, Anderson was able to create this incredibly powerful and effective film.
Perhaps the greatest phenomenon surrounding this movie is how I never got bored. I watched a 158 minute, slow-moving film about a man drilling for oil in Texas, and it had my attention the entire way through. It certainly didn't feel anywhere near 2 hours and 40 minutes. I probably could've gone to three hours and beyond, but it was done so perfectly there was nothing left to add. It was, again, the direction of Paul Thomas Anderson that kept me interested in what was going on the whole way through. He built up this character of Daniel Plainview in a way that made it impossible to turn away. It is truly unbelievable how long this film was able to go, and I didn't lose interest the entire time.
The cinematography of this film was also incredible. It won the Academy Award for Best Achievement in Cinematography, and it was well-deserved. The film captures the claustrophobic setting of being down in a mine in the first scene of the movie. We then have many beautiful landscape shots scattered throughout the film. The scene where the oil shoots into the air and catches on fire late at night is a mesmerizing sight. The lighting in certain scenes, as well as the camera angles used, also fit the mood of each scene very well, and capture all of the little details that add to the realism of it all. Director of photography Robert Elswit truly helped the film in a big way, and made it the beautifully shot movie that it was.
The score of this film was also a major contributor to the overall mood. It was a very unique, often quite strange score, with plenty of dark, unsettling music to match the tone of the movie. There were various unique sounds used throughout the film, and I certainly have never heard a score quite like this one. But, despite how odd it is, I think it perfectly fit the mood of the movie, and in doing so, enhanced the experience of watching it. If music can do that for a movie, then the composer has done their job well.
Now, everything else in this film was done incredibly well. But still, the driving force behind it was Daniel Day-Lewis as Daniel Plainview. He is very well-deserving of the Oscar. His performance was absolutely stunning, and was a huge factor behind how interesting and enjoyable this movie was to watch. He was able to capture Plainview's madness and convey it in a believable and often frightening way. He was scary good in this role, especially in a few scenes in particular, which I will not spoil here. Everything else was great, but if Day-Lewis' performance fell flat, the movie would have suffered terribly. Instead, he went above and beyond, carrying this film to greatness.
Of course, the rest of the cast was overshadowed by Day-Lewis in the lead role, but I thought Paul Dano did a particularly good job as Eli Sunday. At first, his performance was a bit unconvincing for me, but he seemed to get better as the film progressed, to the point where he almost came close to matching Day-Lewis' intensity. Dano did an excellent job of conveying Eli's desperation in his performance, and complimented Day-Lewis quite well with his talent.
Overall, There Will Be Blood checks all of the boxes and ends up being a fascinating story illustrating the greed of mankind. Daniel Day-Lewis gives an absolutely stunning performance and director Paul Thomas Anderson masterfully crafts an intriguing and thought-provoking film. It is an excellent movie whether you are looking at the technical aspects, the deep messaging behind it, or the entertainment value. The subject matter may not be for everyone, but There Will Be Blood is, perhaps a bit surprisingly, a truly great film.