Trying to decide what direction to take when expressing an opinion about a film that is so different and so intriguing is tough to do. Random thoughts follow.
Let's get Daniel Day-Lewis's performance out of the way. He's remarkable here as Daniel Plainview. He's intelligent ruthless vicious and greedy. There's literally nothing to like about him. Paul Dano is Eli Sunday a crooked preacher who is the primary rival of Plainview. Eli is also unlikeable. He's greedy manipulative and naive. The story centers around these two characters and their mistrust and hatred of one another.
Plainview has a son and there is an event that occurs around the halfway point of the film that builds some sympathy for Plainview but we end up hating him even more as Plainview rejects his son because he will be unable to run Plainview's company when he's dead. It's really cruel but it makes perfect sense. From what we know about Plainview it's entirely consistent with his character's traits.
The story starts humbly with Plainview digging for gold and growing his oil business to the point where he can have anything he wants. However what he wants is to destroy his competition. Competition is what drives him. Some will watch this film and decide that this is a commentary on the ills of Capitalism and Religion. Those that pay less attention will believe it to be a finger-pointing parable about the evils of "Big Oil". But this is a story about a man who's competitive spirit could ultimately destroy him.
The film is beautiful to look at and is appropriately slow moving. It takes it's time to build and when it does things get very tense. The ending is sudden but appropriate and allows the viewer to finish Plainview's life story on their own.--wbeehler Saturday August 27 2011 9:23:08 AM