muziq
01-24-2008, 11:07 PM
Just walked in the door from seeing Paul Thomas Anderson's There Will Be Blood. :tu
Set at the turn of the Century, TWBB is the story of Daniel Plainview, a self-made oilman, and his struggle to build an independent oil empire in the hurley-burley world of California petroleum. Daniel Day-Lewis, as you may know, plays the main character, and does a brilliant job, rendering Plainview as a multi-faceted persona torn between pursuing the all-consuming life of an oil magnate and being a respectable human being...and a good father. I'll stop short of a blow-by-blow recap of the story; instead, let me suggest that the story's arc is not unlike any number of classic Hollywood narratives like Citizen Kane or Mildred Pierce (two name only two)--one person's life story as defined by their phenomenal business successes and intense personal failures. It's a beautifully-shot film, full of the harshness of semi-arid S. & Central California, and might very well win multiple Oscars for its visuals, set design, and soundtracking and sound design.
TWBB is based on the Upton Sinclair novel, Oil!, published in 1927. At over 500 pages, Sinclair's novel is both more complex and more compelling than TWBB; the film discards at least two major plotlines that strip away the novel's intense and ever-so-relevant historical context, as well as its political perspective. Oil! was based loosely on the Teapot Dome Scandal and concerns itself more with the oil magnate's son--and his academic, romantic, and worldly education--than with the roughness of Daniel Plainview's existence in TWBB.
If you have the time and inclination, I strongly suggest reading Oil! and seeing TWBB close together, if for no other reason than to see the issues that arise in adapting an incredible novel into an incredible, but altogether different, film. Compared to No Country For Old Men, which is closer to being a word-for-word adaptation, Oil!/TWBB together reveal the degree to which a compelling situation and characters can render very different stories for our imaginations.
BTW: I don't envy the Oscar voters in their decision between Javier Bardem (No Country for Old Men) and Daniel Day-Lewis in the Best Actor category. I'd kill to see a remake of High Noon with the two of them as the main characters in the shootout. Huzza!
Set at the turn of the Century, TWBB is the story of Daniel Plainview, a self-made oilman, and his struggle to build an independent oil empire in the hurley-burley world of California petroleum. Daniel Day-Lewis, as you may know, plays the main character, and does a brilliant job, rendering Plainview as a multi-faceted persona torn between pursuing the all-consuming life of an oil magnate and being a respectable human being...and a good father. I'll stop short of a blow-by-blow recap of the story; instead, let me suggest that the story's arc is not unlike any number of classic Hollywood narratives like Citizen Kane or Mildred Pierce (two name only two)--one person's life story as defined by their phenomenal business successes and intense personal failures. It's a beautifully-shot film, full of the harshness of semi-arid S. & Central California, and might very well win multiple Oscars for its visuals, set design, and soundtracking and sound design.
TWBB is based on the Upton Sinclair novel, Oil!, published in 1927. At over 500 pages, Sinclair's novel is both more complex and more compelling than TWBB; the film discards at least two major plotlines that strip away the novel's intense and ever-so-relevant historical context, as well as its political perspective. Oil! was based loosely on the Teapot Dome Scandal and concerns itself more with the oil magnate's son--and his academic, romantic, and worldly education--than with the roughness of Daniel Plainview's existence in TWBB.
If you have the time and inclination, I strongly suggest reading Oil! and seeing TWBB close together, if for no other reason than to see the issues that arise in adapting an incredible novel into an incredible, but altogether different, film. Compared to No Country For Old Men, which is closer to being a word-for-word adaptation, Oil!/TWBB together reveal the degree to which a compelling situation and characters can render very different stories for our imaginations.
BTW: I don't envy the Oscar voters in their decision between Javier Bardem (No Country for Old Men) and Daniel Day-Lewis in the Best Actor category. I'd kill to see a remake of High Noon with the two of them as the main characters in the shootout. Huzza!