There Will be Blood

There are many ways to judge the quality of an NYU cinema studies recitation. You can judge the vehemence of the students defending their positions on the various topics. There is the value of the materials brought by the TA that day. I, however, find it directly correlated to the amount of time it takes for a freshman to bring up There Will be Blood before the entire recitation group lathers itself up in a sweaty mess of Paul Thomas Anderson love juice.

Now, I'm not saying that TWBB is bad; by no means. It's just really overrated. It's the David Beckham of the cinema world.


Essentially, it's a story about a man named Daniel who is a bit of a crazy antisocial loner and portrays himself as the underdog up against the system, when really he's in truth a megalomaniac millionaire who is a great speaker, actor, and careful manager of his own PR.

So clearly a big stretch for Daniel Day Lewis then...

Let's be clear: this is a pretty simple film which complicates itself with various sound effects and people crying. In fact, lots of crying. So much so that it should have been called There Will Be NO Blood But Lots Of Grown Men Crying. I hear that on the DVD there will be a full extra hour of footage just made of the extra quivers the actors were adding to the end of their words, which had to be edited out in order to keep this movie to its conservative 2 hour and 40 minute running time.

To compensate for the straightforward plot, Anderson inserts a couple of betrayals which can be seen coming like a retarded Elephant crossing the Brooklyn bridge... while banging a drum... and wearing a hat with a propeller on it.

He also insists on disguising the A to B plot in a thick camouflage of grey tint. If this film is to be believed, there were only three proper colors in the early 1900s: grey, yellow and fire, which isn't really a color.

But, despite all this, it does deserve some praise, and maybe the Oscars that it won, too. However, it will only serve to continue the current trend for making ponderous character actor westerns where no one gets shot properly.

Thank you, Ang Lee, you sex-obsessed dick.