There Will Be Blood

There Will Be Blood, starring Daniel Day-Lewis, is a drama film from 2007 based on the novel Oil! by Upton Sinclair. I had never seen this movie prior to viewing it for this review and I was pleasantly surprised. When I first read the basic plot, I thought I might get bored halfway through and flick it off. However, this was not the case. The movie is quite good, and for a movie that’s two and a half hours, it doesn’t drag at all. So let’s begin this new style of review.

OIL

Plot: The movie follows the movements of oil-man Daniel Plainview, played by Day-Lewis, and his turn of the century oil business. The story isn’t really what the movie is about though, it’s about the characters and their personalities, trials, and tribulations. For me, this movie belongs to a genre I like to call Human Drama, which is a drama film that is not guided by the plot, but by the characters. There Will Be Blood is one of the greatest examples of this, there’s a plot, but it doesn’t matter, you’re too entranced with the characters.

Don’t get me wrong, this doesn’t mean the plot isn’t there, or that it isn’t great, because it is. However, it takes a back seat to our amazing cast of characters.

As I said earlier in the review, for a two and a half hour movie, there is relatively little flab on the film. There’s not much I could see that didn’t move the story along.

Plot Score: 8/10        The plot is great, but it’s not the focus of the film.

Characters: Like I said earlier, this is where the film really shines. You have Daniel Plainview, our main character, making his way through the oil world. He has a “son” (not actually his son, but he raised him) named HW, who is played quite well by Dillon Freasier in his very first acting role (according to IMDb.) Family is a huge element to the story, and drives a lot of the story along.

 Day-Lewis is one of the best actors ever

 I still can't believe this was this kid's first movie

In the town of New Boston, which is where most of the movie takes place, you have the Church of the Third Revelation, and it’s preacher Eli Sunday. Paul Dano, who portrays Eli, couldn’t have portrayed him any better. He’s pretty important in moving the plot along, as well as being a huge ass. The whole time I watched the movie, he seems so calm and normal. However, there is an occasional scene where he just explodes. Religion is another huge part of the story in this movie.

 I love his outfit here, makes him look even more like a charlatan

Last but certainly not least, you have Beni from The Mummy. HAHA. I’m so glad to see that this guy actually get’s work. He does a great job in this as Daniel’s “brother”. The actor’s name is Kevin J. O’Connor, and to say the least, I was surprised to see him do so well. In my mind though, he’ll always be Beni.

Oh, Beni how I love thee.

  

Characters Score: 10/10           Believable and realistic characters to say the least.

Design: When I say design what I mean is, scenery, costumes, props, etc. This will probably be the shortest topic, most of the movie takes place outdoors and it looks beautiful. The film is supposed to take place in California and I believe it pulls it off perfectly. The few true “sets”, seem pretty accurate to the period, as does the clothing. I don’t claim to be an expert in this period of history, but to an untrained eye, they seem right. The movie is incredibly beautiful, and well shot.

 This is what most of the movie looks like, just less green

Design Score: 10/10        An absolutely beautiful movie.

Final Thoughts: There Will Be Blood was an instant classic, and the reasoning shows, it’s a beautiful movie with interesting and realistic characters. I’m glad I finally got around to watching it.

 Not sure if this was meant to be funny, but it was hilarious

Rating: 10/10  This movie is damn near the perfect movie, great story, great characters, just a great movie.

My Score: 8/10 I really enjoyed this movie, however, it just didn’t quite do it for me. It was a great movie, it just wasn’t quite up my alley.

So this concludes the first review for this new blog. I hope you all enjoyed it, and stick around for more. I’m batting around a few ideas right now, perhaps a Saturday A-Movie Post and Wednesday B-Movie Post. Not sure at the moment. Thanks for reading, and I’ll talk to you next time.

If you have any comments, suggestions, question, blah, blah, just leave them in a comment on this post.

All images used in this post belong to the copyright holders and are used solely for criticizing purposes. No infringement is intended.

Let's Begin Again!

Alright, this is semi-awkward for me. I have to start another blog, well, I don't really have to. However, the name for the last one wasn't working at all anymore. So now, here I am, to provide something different. So, like last time I'll start by explaining a bit about what I plan to do here. At the moment, I plan on releasing a weekly movie review. The movies are going to be a mix of the 50 movie packs (of which I now have 22) and also more popular A-list movies. The way I'm planning it at the moment, the movie will just be chosen by me. I could do a random draw, however, this tends to bear lackluster results, leaving me with a choice, but not my choice. However, the movie will be random, if I feel like Kung Fu one week, it'll be a Kung Fu movie, the next week could be a romance movie. You get what I'm saying, if there's a genre in particular you'd like to see, just let me know.



Here's some things you can expect:

- New Style: No more pros and cons. I'm going to try and do a slightly more standard review style, it'll be sectioned up into things like: Plot, Characters, Set Design/Scenery, etc. etc. As of writing this, I'm not sure exactly what those categories will be, I think what I have to write about the first film will decide for me.

- New Rating System: This is something I've been thinking about a lot recently. In my 365 reviews, I tended to let my entertainment value control the rating. What I'm thinking for the new ones, will be a score for each section (plot, characters, etc.) Also, a score for how good the movie is (by "good" I mean actual quality of most of the sections put together). Last but not least, there will be a "My Score" or an entertainment value score (This will basically be a score of how much I enjoyed it.)
 
- Better Movies: I, seriously, plan on doing more popular movies now. You will see movies you (should) know on this review more often than not. Another problem with my 365 reviews were screenshot copyright thingies. Yeah, those be damned. I've seen people do a lot worse copyright infringement than stills from a movie. So expect more of those.

- Larger Reviews: Due to the decrease to a weekly schedule, you can expect the reviews to be much bigger. Depending on if my copy of the movie has any special features, I'll probably talk about those too. At least, when they correlate to the movies (ie: Behind the Scenes featurette). So expect more info about the movies in general.

- Possible "Other" Reviews: As of recent, I've been watching a lot of movies. What I'm offering with this is POSSIBLE mid-week mini-reviews. Not guaranteed, but possible.



The release date of my reviews will probably be on Fridays, but I haven't completely decided yet.


Alright, to finish this off, I just want to say thank you. Thank you to all of you who read the 365 stuff and those of you who will read this stuff as well. It means a lot to me.


P.S. If you'd like to request a certain movie be reviewed or have comments or questions, just leave them in the comments section of this or any following post.


P.P.S. Movie collection is up to 2331 movies. So that's awesome.


-Dylan Lanier