There Will Be Blood

You've probably heard the reviews, and you're not going to hear anything different from me. "There Will Be Blood" is an amazing film, the best of the year, the best movie since who knows, and the best of P.T. Anderson's illustrious career (though "Magnolia" is still my favorite). I entered the theater at 10:30, sat with my eyes glued to the screen, and looked at my watch in disbelief upon leaving...That movie was three hours long?!?

So go see it already.

That's not what I want to talk about here. I want to talk about how we view a masterpiece like this. I won't give away specific storylines, but I suggest you see the film before reading further.

Many critics claim Daniel Plainview (played with blistering ferocity by Daniel Day-Lewis) is an allegory for the Bush administration, or Big Oil. This is because they want Daniel Plainview to represent these things.

The showing I saw, the audience seemed to want the film to be a diatribe against the Church, viewing Eli Sunday's charismatic preacher as all the crazy Christians they've heard about, the sort of Christians you and I might stammer out apologies for. This bothered me, because they seemed to think Eli Sunday was a more evil character than Daniel Plainview. The last scene, fortunately, may have turned them on their ear.

I, initially, wanted the film to be about the lust for power and greed, directed at the type of person prone to that sort of thing. This is because I know a few of those types of people, and I want them to be wrong.

Later, I thought about how "There Will Be Blood" is sort of like taking Ayn Rand's ode to egoism, "The Fountainhead", and actually factoring in the Fall of Man. This was because I had a conversation about "The Fountainhead" an hour before we watched the film.

The best and most comprehensive analysis I've read, which you can find here, discusses the themes of fatherhood (a recurring theme in Paul Thomas Anderson films) and of man's desire to be God.

"There Will Be Blood" might be, at least to some extent, about all these things.

But what strikes me now is how a great piece of art is about whatever we want it to be about, whatever backs up our worldview.

Post-modern Christians, this site especially, have a habit of finding the Christian elements in every bit of secular art. We find every "Christ-figure" and redemptive theme in whatever we hear and see. Often those themes are really there, whether the artist intends it or not. Often, our perspective as Christians allows us insight into themes and meanings other people can't get.

Sometimes, though, we might be telling ourselves a lie. Sometimes we just want to point out the good points, smearing over what we see as bad. Sometimes we read the Bible this way, and sometimes we treat God like our jack-in-the-box.

"There Will Be Blood" does not end with redemption or joy or any discernible presence of God.

If there's a criticism, it's that the ending wasn't bleak enough. It's an amazing film.