There Will Be Blood (Two-Disc Special Collector's Edition)

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Product Description
Studio: Paramount Home Video Release Date: 04/08/2008 Run time: 158 minutes Rating: R

Amazon.com
Unmistakably a shot at greatness, Paul Thomas Anderson's There Will Be Blood succeeds in wild, explosive ways. The film digs into nothing less than the sources of peculiarly American kinds of ambition, corruption, and industry--and makes exhilarating cinema from it all. Although inspired by Upton Sinclair's 1927 novel Oil!, Anderson has crafted his own take on the material, focusing on a black-eyed, self-made oilman named Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis), whose voracious appetite for oil turns him into a California tycoon in the early years of the 20th century. The early reels are a mesmerizing look at the getting of oil from the ground, an intensely physical process that later broadens into Plainview's equally indomitable urge to control land and power. Curious, diverting episodes accumulate during Plainview's rise: a mighty derrick fire (a bravura opportunity that Anderson, with the aid of cinematographer Robert Elswit, does not fail to meet), a visit from a long-lost brother (Kevin J. O'Connor), the ongoing involvement of Plainview's poker-faced adoptive son (Dillon Freasier). As the film progresses, it gravitates toward Plainview's rivalry with the local representative of God, a preacher named Eli Sunday (brimstone-spitting Paul Dano); religion and capitalism are thus presented not so much as opposing forces but as two sides of the same coin. And the worm in the apple here is less man's greed than his vanity. Anderson's offbeat take on all this--exemplified by the astonishing musical score by Jonny Greenwood--occasionally threatens to break the film apart, but even when it founders, it excites. As for Daniel Day-Lewis, his performance is Olivier-like in its grand scope and its attention to details of behavior; Plainview speaks in the rum-rich voice of John Huston, and squints with the wariness of Walter Huston. It's a fearsome performance, and the engine behind the film's relentless power. --Robert Horton

Customer Reviews: Read 355 more reviews...

5 out of 5 stars

Great movie, disappointing DVD special edition--5 star movie, 2 star extras--go for the single disc edition April 3, 2008
384 out of 421 found this review helpful

When is a "Collector's Edition" not a collector's edition? When the second disc barely has an one hour's worth of additional featurettes and other extras. "There Will Be Blood" deserved to be recognized as one of the finest films from last year. That's not to say the film is perfect but its flaws are pretty easy to overlook because of Paul Thomas Anderson's sweeping and ambitious storytelling. I'd recommend the single disc edition as the "Collector's Edition" doesn't have all that much in the way of extras. The single disc edition is really all you need even though it doesn't have ANY extras.

The packaging for this set is horrible (which I could forgive if the discs weren't scratched up in the process). How did this get past the marketing department at Paramount?

"There Will Be Blood" based on Upton Sinclair's novel OIL! gives us two portraits of two very different men both ruled by their own obsession--Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis in his Oscar winning role who seems to be channeling John Huston from the film "Chinatown")an oil man who in spite of his impressive skills as a smooth talking salesman, doesn't like people very much (aside from his son H.W. which he uses to help sell people that his is "a family business") and Eli Sunday (Paul Dano)a smooth talking healer and leader of the Church of the Third Relevation. Both men want wealth and power for Plainview its a means to escape. While Sunday sees the oil leaking out of the ground of his father's ranch to gather a flock, reach out with his message and, in turn, gain the power that he believes he deserves. The two men don't get along from the moment they meet--Eli is on to Daniel's "plain speaking" way of doing business and getting something for next to nothing and Daniel believes that Eli is a charlatan. In their own way each is a hard nosed uncompromising businessman with visions that don't mesh.

The DVD:

Robert Elswit's cinematography deservedly won an Oscar for the film and while the DVD transfer looks good, the night sequences are a bit murky and dark. Detail overall is pretty good with a color scheme that accurately captures the theatrical look of the film.

Audio sounds terrific nicely reproducing Johnny Greenwood's score.

There are no extras on the first disc which has a menu as plain as Daniel's view of the world. The second disc features a vintage silent featurette that runs about 27 minutes and uses Greenwood's score to accompany it. It tells the "story" of oil and shows us how oilmen hunted for it and brought it to market.

We also get "15 Minutes" a collection of vintage stills from the era taken around oil sites, behind-the-scenes footage and various clips showing all the work that Anderson and his crew put into researching the film. It's a silent segment accompanied by music and lasts, yep, just over 15 minutes.

Next up we two deleted scenes that last nearly ten minutes. Under three minutes "Dallies Gone Wild" is an alternate take of the restaurant scene involving Daniel, his son H.W. and employees of Standard Oil.

We also get the teaser for the film and the original theatrical trailer both of which remind me of the lost art of crafting a great trailer that will pull in an audience without giving away too much. All things considered, this is a disappointing "Collector's Edition" even with the awkward collectable packaging that is included (where the discs slide inside) and would be prone to damage with time.

Conclusion: A powerful, terrific film and one of the ten best from 2007, "There Will Be Blood" appears in a disappointing special edition from Paramount. The film looks fine and the soundtrack is brilliantly rendered which should be enough to get fans to purchase the single disc DVD and that's what I would recommend.

The extras on disc two of the "Collector's Edition" are slim pickings to say the least. It's as if Paramount rushed to pull this material together in light of the Academy Award nominations and wins the film scored. They are very disappointing for a two disc edition and I can't strongly recommend the two disc edition based on this. If you just want the film, go for the single disc edition and wait to see what the Blu-ray comes packs in the way of special features.

A reminder...Voting at amazon.com is about whether or not the review helped you decide to purchase the product NOT about whether or not you agree with the reviewer. That's what the comments section is designed for. If you have seen the movie and didn't like it, write a review.

4 out of 5 stars

A Long, Dark Journey into the Soul of Greed and Power April 11, 2008
170 out of 180 found this review helpful

Upton Sinclair's epic novel OIL! has been successfully transformed to a film by screen writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson ('Magnolia','Boogie Nights', etc). The film is a long song (158 minutes), covering a fascinating span of time in turn of the century California when oil gained the lure of gold and transformed the land and the people into creatures of capitalism and greed and lust, and were it not for the presence of Daniel Day-Lewis' powerful performance as the man who makes it all happen, the story itself would become tiresome. It doesn't.

Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis) is a silver miner in 1898, but soon discovers oil and begins on a mission to become wealthy, owning most of the oil fields from the mountains of central California to the Pacific Ocean. With his medicine man manner of getting people to do what he wants he pursues his greed relentlessly, disrupting small sleepy towns like Little Boston as he gains access to the wealth of the black gold. There are odd characters along the way, such as the evangelist Eli Sunday (Paul Dano) who become crushable clods beneath Plainview's boots. The progress of the story is well known to most: it is the telling of the tale in the hands of wholly credible, completely physically immersed Daniel Day-Lewis that makes the story seem new.

The film's grimy atmosphere is well presented in Robert Elswit's cinematography and the odd musical score by Jonny Greenwood is as ominous as the vantage of Plainview. Greenwood elects to weave classical works into the fabric of the film: when young HW falls deaf after an explosion the silence is partnered by one of Arvoe Paert's 'Fratres', and the film's credits are displayed over the Anne-Sophie Mutter/von Karajan recording of Brahms' Violin Concerto. Strange bedfellows, yes, but entirely appropriate to the overall mood of the film. The journey is long and depressing, but the power of Day-Lewis' performance is magic. Grady Harp, April 08

5 out of 5 stars

The American Dream January 12, 2008
109 out of 137 found this review helpful

Paul Thomas Anderson's "There Will Be Blood" is a big bold, eccentric, crazy film, based on Socialist author Upton Sinclair's 1927 novel "Oil," which proposes the thesis that Capitalism brings about positive change but change that ultimately destroys the future: a double edged sword that cut both ways. So much of "TWBB" reminds me of Nathanial West's Hollywood Novels of the 30's like "Miss Lonelyhearts" and "Day of the Locust," novels filled with grotesques and grotesque, outlandish actions. Plainview would fit right in with West's fringe dwellers.
At the center of "TWBB" is the towering performance of Daniel Day Lewis as Daniel Plainview, who at the beginning of the film (1898) is a not very successful Silver miner who ends up by film's end as a just barely holding onto reality, whacked out richest Oilman in California. Lewis's performance is feral, animalistic, and fierce...all squinting eyes, guttural voice and slouching posture: Lewis feels every word he utters throughout his body. He pulls out all the stops and creates a character that resonates with pathos and humanity but his Plainview is also a symbol of a time when it was possible to get ahead by setting goals, setting out into a "new" world, grabbing yourself by the seat of your pants and forcing your will upon others and getting ahead: making money, saving, spending wisely...attaining the so-called American Dream in the sense that James Truslow Adams wrote about it in his "Epic of America" in the 1930's. Lewis's Plainview is Evil personified ("I despise success in others") yet writer/director Anderson has allowed him to have a positive inner life primarily centered on his son who he papalbly adores focusing all of his available adoration on him.
Let no one dissuade you from this: Lewis's performance here is on par with Brando's in "Streetcar" or Paul Newman's in "Hud." It's a performance that actors will be referring to for many years to come.
Plainview's main antagonist is Paul Dano's Eli Sunday, a young preacher who creates the Church of the Third Revelation in the oil fields. Thomas sets up a battle between the two: the supposedly ultimate Capitalist and the lowly man of God: a kind of Battle of the Titans: Capitalism vs. Evangelism. Their big, penultimate confrontation is as big and bold and over-the-top as even Anderson's own Shower of Frogs in "Magnolia."
"There will be Blood" grabs you from the first frame and doesn't let you go until the last frame of the last reel spools out. It is poetic, thoughtful, beautiful in many ways as well as ugly, real, ghoulish in others. Because Anderson's vision here is so aggressively solemn and ominous even Calvinist,"There Will be Blood" will naturally be misunderstood by many but ultimately this film will be remembered and revered for many, many years to come.

5 out of 5 stars

Greed, That is. Black Gold. Texas Tea December 31, 2007
98 out of 118 found this review helpful

"There Will Be Blood" is probably the absolute best film of the year, and this is due to more than the extraordinary talent of Daniel Day-Lewis. At its core, it tells a story of insatiable greed, of how the lust for absolute power can drive anyone into a state of pure evil. Based on Upton Sinclair's novel "Oil!" the descent of oil tycoon Daniel Plainview (Lewis) is long and slow, but it's definitely constant--he starts off in 1902 with drive, passion, and charisma, only to lose himself to hate, arrogance, and a complete lack of decency by 1927. By the end of the film, absolutely nothing about this man is likeable, and one gets the sense that he wanted it that way all along: "I hate most people," he says at one point. "I look at people and I see nothing worth liking." Here's a character that can't be pitied, simply because he created exactly what he wanted for himself.

The first ten minutes of "There Will Be Blood" contains no dialogue, but it still manages to establish a cohesive story. It begins in 1898, during which a lone prospector digs for oil in the mountainous deserts of Texas. By 1902, an entire team led by Plainview has made camp in the area and has successfully struck oil. One day, a well accident kills one of the workers, leaving an infant boy without his father. For as yet unknown reasons--be they selfless or selfish--Plainview decides to care for the boy and raise him as his own. The story then flashes forward to 1911, which opens with Plainview trying to negotiate a deal with the locals of a small town. When the deal falls through, Plainview is introduced to Paul Sunday (Paul Dano), a young man from a small community called Little Boston; he offers Plainview his family's property in exchange for a handsome sum of money. Apparently, that property is rich with oil.

Without missing a beat, Plainview and his son, H.W. (Dillon Freasier), enter Little Boston posing as quail hunters. After discovering that the Sunday property does, indeed, contain oil, and after setting up camp with his team, Plainview gets acquainted with the devoutly religious Sunday family. The son, Eli (also played by Paul Dano), is thought to be a spiritual healer, and he shows this side of himself during some passionate church meetings. He and Plainview share an interesting relationship, to say the least; Plainview initially states that he likes all churches and thus doesn't belong to any specific sect of Christianity, but as the film progresses, it's obvious that church--or more specifically, God--has not and never will be a part of his life. Eli, who believes he has the power to heal his fellow parishioners, falls into disfavor when H.W. has an oil-related accident that can't be healed.

Things take an unexpected turn when a man claiming to be Plainview's long lost half brother enters the picture. His name is Henry (Kevin J. O'Connor), and he's come from a job in New Mexico to be a part of Plainview's life, to work for him and help him find more oil. Something about him clearly isn't right from H.W.'s point of view, and he makes this clear through a drastic act I won't reveal. I will say that, as time goes on, Plainview also begins to suspect Henry, which actually isn't saying a whole lot since his very nature is to be distrustful. One understands this all throughout the film--with even the subtlest of expressions, Plainview can easily express the anger, hostility, and fear that are slowly taking control. It seems all he has left is to let himself be manipulated, especially by Eli: if he wants permission to run an oil pipe through a piece of property he doesn't own, he must agree to be baptized in Eli's church. And as you might expect, Eli will actually be leading the ceremony. Watching Plainview being forced to say things he doesn't believe is a mesmerizing experience, not only because it foreshadows what lies ahead, but also because the scene is incredibly intense.

Pretty much the same thing can be said about the entire film, which thrives on tension despite appearing to be low-key. One of Lewis' expressions is an almost frightening counterpoint to Johnny Greenwood's score, a Bernard Hermann-inspired opus of screeching, tremulous strings. Such music is heard even during the "calmer," "insignificant" moments, such as shots of Plainview walking from one room to another. This would be inappropriate were this any other film. But this isn't any other film; "There Will Be Blood" is all about expressing Plainview's emotional turmoil, and as such, it's easy to believe that he's never had a quiet moment in his head. It's also easy to believe that entering his mind would be one of the most terrifying experiences imaginable, not just because of his contempt for humanity, but also because of the depths to which his contempt will sink him.

The final twenty minutes of this film takes place in 1927, at which point Plainview is more morally than physically aged. He's rich beyond his wildest dreams, yet he's emotionally bankrupt, and this is shown through two brief but significant meetings. I won't describe what happens or reveal whom he speaks to, but I will say he does everything he can to make everyone hate him, including us. In essence, we hate him just as much as he hates himself, which isn't pathetic so much as it's detestable. I realize that such an ending is not a typical crowd pleaser, but considering the story that's being told, typical doesn't apply, here. This goes double for Daniel Day-Lewis' performance, one of the best I've seen in a long time. To sum everything up with a brief phrase, "There Will Be Blood" is an absolutely brilliant film.

1 out of 5 stars

BLOODY POINTLESS January 12, 2008
44 out of 127 found this review helpful

What a disappointment.

I bought into the carefully manipulated hype. But you don't have to.

Daniel Day-Lewis does a great John Huston impersonation (a la Noah Cross in "Chinatown') and the clever vintage production design by Jack Fisk is outstanding. But the story, very loosely "inspired" by Upton Sinclair's "Oil!" is totally devoid of redeeming elements. The main character starts out bad and stays bad: a greed-driven psychopath. We get no insight whatsoever. And the only rootable character is mostly mute.

The first half of the movie is a great set-up for a terrific story. But plot-wise, nothing new happens after that. No twists or surprises or character development or complications or payoffs or revelations or redemption. None of the things that make a story a story.

At the end of the movie I was angry at not being entertained or enlightened to say nothing of losing two hours and 28 minutes of my life.

It is incredible that critics can write words that -- even in out-of-context excerpts -- praise this movie. Why are people so intimidated by a few critics superficial praise that they can't think for themselves even when in their hearts they know otherwise?

This movie is not in the same league as "No Country For Old Men" even though both have a psychopath as a main character.

And what did the way-over-the-top ridiculous ending have to do with the story (such as it was)?

Even if you have nothing to do and can see if for free, I wouldn't recommend it.

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