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Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis) describes himself as an oil man and a family man with family values when he wants to strike a deal. What he doesn’t tell is that his “son” and “partner” H.W. (Dillon Freasier) isn’t really his son, but the orphaned son of an oil worker who died in an accident, and he uses him merely as a prop to convince business partners of his trustworthyness.
Plainview doesn’t believe in family, god or any other values except of oil and money, and he hates all people as he confesses to a man who appears later and claims to be his brother.
His antagonist is Eli Sunday (Paul Dano), a self-proclaimed priest of his own Church of the Third Revelation. Plainview buys the oil-rich land of the Sunday’s but pays only half of the agreed price, and he humiliates Eli further by publicly refusing to let him bless the first oil well. When the same oil well catches fire, H.W. loses his hearing in the explosion, and Daniel sends him away to a school for the deaf.
Daniel also alienates his competitors from Standard Oil who want to buy him out and threatens to kill the agent who suggests he should take care of his son with the money from the buy-out.
Years later, Daniel Plainview lives alone in a huge estate (just like Citizen Kane), madness, alcohol and a shotgun his only companions, and throws away the last chance to come to terms with his “son” H.W. before his final encounter with Eli Sunday.

Daniel Plainview is the ultimate capitalist - and at the begin of his career, you may admire him for his strength and determination. Everything he achieves, he achieves himself, through hard work and a strong will. But then, all he ever wants is more money, more success, and he doesn’t care if it’s necessary to deceive or defraud people - or to exploit a child.
And he will stop at nothing when he deems it necessary to accomplish his goals. Somewhere deep inside he might realize how empty his life has become, because he totally overreacts and irrationally threatens the Standard Oil agent with murder when he dares to mention Daniel’s (non-existent) family life. But greed has long since eaten his soul, and the only way to go for Daniel is the descent into madness. Daniel Day-Lewis by all means deserved the Oscar for Best Actor for his performance.

Eli Sunday is similar - and at the same time, totally different. He wants to be successful, just like Plainview, and he wants recognition, but he is weak, and while he admires Plainview for his success, he hates him for how he treats Eli and his family. What he lacks in strength, he owns in deviousness, and he gets his revenge for the humiliation he suffered from Daniel. But ultimately, Eli is merely a parasite to Daniel’s predator - and There Will Be Blood.

This entry was posted on Monday, February 25th, 2008 at 2:53 pm and is filed under 4-star-movies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.