Why So Many People Hate This Excellent Movie...

Rating: 9/10 (29 January 2011)

Why Daniel Plainview becomes such an evil character - that his personal motives are not clearly stated - is too much of a question for many people. The "answer", if in fact there's any real mystery, can be found in the film's superb cinematic method. This method is the curious angles, the vast vistas, the jump cut edits, and the subtle rhythms that form an eloquent but mute narration that tells a much more vivid story than any dialog or exposition ever could. It's in the near silences of pure movie action that we are able to glimpse the the dark forces that drive Daniel Plainview. People unaccustomed to or ignorant of the pleasures to be found in the act of reflection and contemplation will likely find these moments of the film to be very boring and too self indulgent. That's a tragedy, for them, because it's a great thrill to be included in the creative process, to be counted on to complete the story in our own minds where the creations of our own imaginations are so tremendously satisfying. Apparently, so many people are just too intellectually limited, to damn impatient, to appreciate this film's subtle power.
Daniel Day Lewis has created a genuinely sinister persona, a compellingly complex villain, from just a few scraps of curious behavior. When we first meet him as an ambitious young man he already is something of an oddity. Daniel's character, his temperament, is powerfully restrained, disciplined, but volatile, explosive. Though his outbursts are few, they are impressive, and the threat of their recurrence at any moment darkens all his encounters. But his fiery disposition serves him well in forging his own path, in carving out a life for himself in an unforgiving, harsh environment. And it's precisely this fierce individualistic streak that both fuels his professional progress and sabotages his personal relations.
His great ambitions - an obvious parallel of those of our republic's early years - seem reasonable and worthwhile. And, as Daniel is fond of professing to the naive, vulnerable locals whom he so willfully defrauds, all our achievements are worthless if not done for the benefit of the family. His family, a chanced upon orphan boy, serves him well as an effective prop in his nefarious deceptions. But he does love the boy, and he does otherwise treat him quite well. It's complicated.
And it gets very complicated when he chooses to send the boy away to school following a tragic accident. It seems a reasonable enough decision at first, difficult as it is for us to witness. Daniel is blind to the error of this choice till it is made clear to him in a miraculously complex moment of self realization. This moment of clarity occurs while he is performing a very public ruse before the local congregation, pretending to be born again as a ploy to gain possession of a local man's land. As he begins his renouncement we sense that there's a sly devil at play within him. Daniel barely conceals his raging contempt for the young minister who is sincerely relishing this very public humiliation of his bitter rival. But soon Daniel's defiance seems to relax, his hidden rage transforms. He is, it seems, experiencing a genuine revelation, as he roars louder and louder the words the minister feeds him: "I have abandoned my child. I have abandoned my boy!"
"Yes, you have abandoned your boy" I was almost saying out loud, as the truth of his action is suddenly revealed. And he has this charlatan minister to thank for his redemption. Daniel realizes this and he smiles as the howling minister violently slaps him in the face harder and harder, again and again. Soon, the passion of the moment recedes, and Daniel is accepted into the community, and sits exhausted in the pew with a warm embrace from the young girl who happens to be the daughter of the rancher he first conned and is the sister of the disingenuous minister. Daniel has simultaneously gained a profound insight into his own character and has amazingly dodged the corrupt minister's envious wrath. Has he beaten God, the Devil, both, or maybe neither. Then, without any obvious cues or overt indications, I was then somehow increasingly aware that Daniel's psychic triumph will now only lead to a harsh retaliation against the minister. Just what form that retribution will take or when it will occur is unclear. This all is transmitted so very subtly, so very artfully, without any dialog, just through Daniel's remarkable performance. This subtlety is the reason so many viewers are so underwhelmed by and contemptuous of this mature, intelligent film. There is then a profound sense of impending doom infusing the remainder of the film. It's just a matter of time now till destiny is fulfilled, till providence wins out. And when it suddenly, unexpectedly does, it's doubly shocking. How and why Daniel does what he does is so grimly, so exquisitely satisfying, that I was shocked with myself, with my primal reaction.
This self revelation, that I can be shocked by my own impulses and desires, is a deeply disturbing aspect of the human psyche that PT Anderson has chosen to illuminate. It's the point, it seems, of the movie. And then I was stunned to realize that what I had just witnessed may well have been merely the hysterical delusion of a crazed, relentless, senile mind. Did what just occur "really" happen, or was it a brutal dream, a waking nightmare? This remarkable, challenging question of whether or not we can trust our own eyes, apparently, is lost on just about everyone who has seen this film. And that's a very big, very critical loss. But I think I shouldn't be surprised...