A Flurry of Films

This weekend was one of elevated intellect, elevated insight, and elevated blood pressure.

The first two are owed in part to the vast amount of films I watched. The last has to do with the $4.03 I paid per gallon of gas, as well as the promise of seven years indentured servitude and my firstborn child.

America’s national holidays let me savor time that I wouldn't have had originally, and provide a cathartic release to watch all of the films I’ve wanted to watch over the past few years but have made excuse - you know. "Oh, I can't, not tonight, A Shot of Love with Tela Tequila is on ... is she straight? Is she bi? Is she greedy and attention-seeking?" "Not tonight, I have a headache," "..." and so on and so forth. But with little excuse, barring my iTunes library is already too full, I decided, with no time like the present, that this was the weekend to catch up.

I have a friend who won't watch the Oscars unless she has watched all films nominated that year. At least for best picture. I’m not sure how she feels about Foley editing or best-set intern - I’m just talking about the majors.

I’ll start with the one I saw last: there will be blood.

Daniel Day-Lewis plays (incredibly, I might add) the hardened, articulate oil tycoon Daniel Plainview, a man bent on striking deals and finding as much black gold as possible. He claims to be a family man, caring for his prepubescent son, H.W. (whom he adopted, an orphan child of one of his dead workers).

The film follows several decades of Plainview’s life, from humble beginnings in the 1890's where he digs for silver but finds black gold, all the way until the 1920's, where Plainview has evolved, gone to seed, and the years seem to be catching up on him. The humble, concise Paul Sunday (Paul Dano, who plays the identical twin Eli as well) once approaches Plainview in the late 1890's about his family's goat farm, where he believes there is a lucrative market for oil drilling. And thus begins the transformation of the sleepy town of little Boston from religious bastion to industrial behemoth.

The clarity in which Paul Thomas Anderson writes and directs makes this film an instant classic. And let's not talk about DDL - who listened to old turn-of-the-century recordings to adapt the speech patterns of men of the time. And his mustache? Day-Lewis means business. Oil business.

In this sleepy Texas town (which was coincidentally filmed right next to its Oscar contender, no country for old men) we find less of what life is like in 20th century oil country and more of the evolution - or regression - of a man. Plainview reveals to his brother, "I have a competition in me. I want no one else to succeed. I hate most people." you don't get a plainer view on Plainview than that.

I drink your milkshake.

Watch this movie. Now. Or there will be blood.

Tomorrow: If you're lucky (or if I’m up to it) an in-depth review of the season finale of LOST.

Quote of the day: "I drink your milkshake."