To play a flawed, extremely complex character, you need an actor with great perception for the intricacies of the role. You need an actor of the stature of Daniel Day Lewis. One thing that struck me, was that had played a similar type of character in the “Gangs of new York” but here he has the tones and looks of an older man, whose mind has been twisted and warped and ground down so that all he can feel is hatred for lesser mortals. When we first see him he is alone and is the victim of an accident in a maladroitly built mine.The film opens with a long period without any dialogue, perhaps we are being drawn into the terrain and the ambience is being created through silence and images.

This the turn of the century and the oil industry is in its infancy and is a perilous line of work, accidents are aplenty. A terrible accident befalls him and perhaps this infuses his relentless competitiveness to succeed. At first he is seen as an affable businessman, with a gruff but soothing caring voice who would, we might imagine strike honourable deals. Daniel Plainview, adopts the son of a worker killed in a mine accident and uses him as a kind of “marketing tool” he talks to people of family values.

There are missing elements in his life, to which we are blind to, has a wife featured in his life?

Perhaps these are the elements that lie behind this welling up of anger? When ever probed on such matters, he just clams up. Equally any criticism on the way he brings up his son, is met with ferocious angry retorts.

His business grows and then a young man arrives Paul Sunday (Paul Dano), telling him of land where oil is boundless, on his family estate. After some haggling the young man reveals where this oil rich land is. He arrives with his adopted son using the guise of being quail hunters. Plainview then attempts to buy the property without telling Paul's father, Abel (David Willis), of the oil, but Paul's twin brother, Eli (also Paul Dano), knows of the oil and raises the price to $10,000, which he designates to fund his own church. Plainview pays him $5,000 up front and promises the other $5,000 as a donation to the Church, the bizarrely named church of the Third Revelation. An unlikely and unequal relationship grows between the church man and the oil industry man, with Plainview, always in the ascendancy.

Suddenly there is almost divine retribution, as suddenly a huge quantity of oil is released skywards but at the same time Plainview’s adopted son loses his hearing, as consequence of the blast. The music that accompanies the most dramatic scenes, really enhances the dark atmosphere. Jonny Greenwood', a member of the British group Radiohead, was responsible for such a notable and powerful soundtrack. Now Plainview cannot control or order around his son in the way he previously could. Perhaps this sorrow is taken out on the “faith healer” the baby faced Eli, who he attacks and just about stops short of murdering. The strong personality against the weak and there is no match, no contest. I recalled scenes in the Clockwork Orange, when the main character savagely attacks a down and out and a similar mirrored scene in American Psycho, when the main character also picks on a hobo and releases all his pent up anger and frustration, an archetypal bully, picking on easy prey. Plainview’s ultimate pleasure seems to be to humiliate, and tread on Eli and he has no self control over this.

Oil and wealth only seems to darken the soul of Plainview and we have to ask, what ultimately are its rewards. He eventually buys himself a large house, with sources of amusement, like a ten pin bowling alley, but it is empty, there is nobody for him to play with and indulge in these trinkets of wealth, and it is a house void of life. Finally Plainview is found sleeping on the floor, he is a miserable drunk, a broken man, who has no self respect or limits to his actions. His house is certainly devoid of love and companionship. When it comes to setting up business deals and all elements to do with the oil industry Plainview is a professional, sharp and clinical, wily and fiercely astute but in matters to do with emotion, he is crippled and painfully flawed. This is not to say he is totally charm less, because sometimes his behaviour though eccentric, can be witty and amusing.

It is amazing the lengths people will go to extract this black foul pungent smelling dense liquid, risking their lives. At least the end products of gold and silver can be beautiful. In a way this foul liquid has in directly caused wars and conflicts and deaths and which threatens our environment and the future of future children.

It has made many rich, but maybe like Plainview it has darkened their souls, they are distanced from their fellow human beings, filled with mistrust, a gluttony for more wealth. It can corrupt anybody and even tarnish and discredit people purporting to be religious men as in Eli, the insipid charlatan, always overtly acting, to people easily taken in, peddling religion, easy for the gullible and simple folks to be mesmerized, but less so for the pragmatic more knowing like Plainview.. It is plain Eli is blinded by prospects of riches. It begs the question can religion and in more recent times capitalistic institution of the oil industry live side by side or will mans lust for money prove overbearing and morality and goodness corrupted. This film is unrestrained in showing the ugliest side of human nature, it’s message is undiluted and harsh. It is a very powerful film visually, showing the power of nature and its inherent dangers.

It seems to have early biblical parallels. It is a parable about life. It is well crafted and imaginative, well conceived by director Paul Thomas Anderson.

The film is lead by an imperious actor Daniel Day Lewis and it’s atmosphere underpinned by a haunting sound track. Was the birth of the oil industry the beginning of the end of the environment and ultimately the end of the world? More is the pity we are all dependant on this dark liquid destroyer.

Francis H. Powell is originally from England and moved to Paris in 1999. In addition to being a writer (articles, songs and poems), he is a painter, DJ and English trainer. For more information, please click here to read his complete bio.

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