a dark, gripping, and multilayered showing

Rating: Null/10 (22 January 2008)

Greed and corruption; family and fortune; faith and religion; spiritualists and swindlers; an embittered, self-serving, charismatically twisted individual eroded by his own selfish desires; these elements and more are the basis of this spellbinding film set at the turn of the 20th century oil industry, centering around an independent prospector (Day-Lewis) driven by his rapacious desire for large profit and uncompromising contempt for the human race. He's earned credibility as a chief manufacturer of oil, but to expand his empire and become enormously wealthy he follows an anonymous tip that leads him to a small California town. Once there, he matches wits with an influential young pastor (Dano) with an equally ambitious agenda. Paul Thomas Anderson's brooding, ominous tale takes its time to unfold, but emerges as a masterwork of superior storytelling with startling scenes, a haunting score, and strong acting, headlined by an astonishing Day-Lewis as miserly misanthrope Daniel Plainview. ***½