One Battle After Another, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, is in cinemas now.
At the heart of this driving tale of revolution and retribution is a motherless daughter and her once-feisty, now drug-drowsy dad played by a scruffy, bathrobe-wearing Leonardo DiCaprio. It’s a story about how far you will go to change the world, and what you will sacrifice to save your loved ones.
It’s also a Paul Thomas Anderson movie and his second one – after 2014’s Inherent Vice, his only cinematic dud – based on a Thomas Pynchon novel. This one is a looser adaptation of Pynchon’s 1990’s Vineland, which was set in the Reagan era. He keeps the book’s central father-daughter characters, but adds his own updates.
The result is nearly three hours long, a film that is violent and darkly comedic, like a Coen brothers’ flick, with sensational performances from DiCaprio, Sean Penn and impressive newcomer Chase Infiniti as daughter Willa. It’s a movie of perfectly calibrated chaos of the most exhilarating kind.
When his revolutionary lover falls foul of the law and disappears into the night, new dad Bob Ferguson (DiCaprio) is left literally holding their baby. Sixteen years on, washed-up Bob has given up the political fight to raise the plucky teen to be good in school and quick on her feet. But when a former adversary kidnaps Willa, Bob has to pull himself off the couch and rediscover that radical spirit.
Here, Anderson’s witty Pynchonesque details range from mockingly ridiculous – Penn’s military villain is Col Steven J Lockjaw; another baddy is named Billy Toejam, while a bunch of rich white businessmen belong to an elite club called The Christmas Adventurers – to the alarmingly contemporary American themes of anti-immigrant politics and corporate-led white supremacy.
There’s never a dull moment in this exciting race against time and hitmen as the film expertly juggles humour (DiCaprio plays Bob as a fall guy, but never a fool) with its serious criticisms of bigotry and abuse of power. As always, Penn morphs completely into his role as the unsympathetic, pathetic antagonist, with the gait of a socially inept misanthrope and the gravelly voice of Nick Nolte.
Anderson’s regular composer, Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood, provides another scintillating score that oscillates between relentlessly stressful and delightfully tinkling, throwing in a few chords that ominously evoke A Clockwork Orange.
With 11 unsung Academy Award nominations under his belt, will Anderson’s battle for a win finally be over?
Rating out of five: ★★★★½
