One Battle After Another Review

Paul Thomas Anderson’s new film, One Battle After Another, takes a considerable amount of time to establish the core conflict, and the overall tone of the movie leans towards the humorous side. Even though the Story is about the father-daughter connection, Anderson uses a different approach to make it an action-packed drama and an effective satire on white supremacists. By focusing on the interesting drama in the Story and putting the politics in the backdrop, Anderson manages to use humor to critique and, to an extent, spoof certain cinematic traits.

The Story is set against the backdrop of an ongoing fight between the left revolutionists and the authorities as the left are trying to protect the immigrants. Perfidia Beverly Hills is the leader of that group, and Pat Calhoun is her partner who accompanies her in their risky missions against the military. At one point, after Perfidia gave birth to a girl child, she was caught by the authorities during one of their operations, forcing Pat to leave the place with their daughter. What we see here are the events that unfold almost 16 years after this incident.

The movie is investing in the lives of the rebels to show how their decisions shape them as individuals, rather than trying to echo their politics. You are being placed as an onlooker for a larger part, and the focus is on the character Pat, who, in many ways, is trying to gel in with this community. He is not your typical alpha male, and he is clearly not the type of guy you would associate with such risky revolts. Paul Thomas Anderson is actually using Pat to give the audience some perspective about how different the brain works for these people who are committed to these fights. Then you have this parallel track of Col. Steven Lockjaw, who aspires to be in that top-secret agency of the white supremacists. The man is dead serious, and that is precisely what makes him hilarious on screen.

The politically sensitive topics like the lives of immigrants and their empathizers are actually being looked at with a lighter tone. There is a lengthy patch in the movie where we see Pat taking help from his daughter’s martial arts trainer, and it leads to this elaborate escape sequence that shows the network that supports immigrants. While it shows the reality to us, the pacing and how the conversations unfold in that area, especially that one phone call where Pat can’t crack the password, keep the movie in a softer space. The most gripping phase in the film happens in the last quarter, where you get that classic wild wild west vibes with footage of wave-like straight roads, and the way Anderson builds angst in those portions is just brilliant.

The lighter tone the movie gets as the perspective is from Pat enables Anderson to include humor in the most unlikely places. In the areas in the screenplay where we experience the developments from Pat, aka Bob’s, perspective, the cinematography has a very turbulent style. There are moments in the movie where we see the very rarely used zooms happening in scenes. When the narrative shifts to Lockjaw, the tempo is much calmer, and we have static frames shuttling between extreme close-ups and extreme wide shots, creating an unsettling negative energy. The action blocks that happen in the final act of the movie are pretty brutal, and the interesting thing about the scale of this movie is that it is largely invested in creating backdrops that aren’t that evident in frames. You have riots and stunt sequences, but the POV of the camera is such that it almost feels like they used the guerilla mode to shoot those portions.

Leonardo DiCaprio, in my opinion, is actually enabling this movie to get a wider audience. It is definitely a challenging character, as his desperation in situations makes the whole film funny. He ensures that Bob’s eccentricities provide the required humor while it feels real. Sean Penn is hilarious as the colonel. There is a fragility in the guy when it comes to facing certain realities, and he portrays that vulnerability without going into theatrical acting. The one name that makes an impression with the performance is Chase Infiniti as Willa. From being this typical teenage girl who quarrels with her father to going through an unprecedented scenario from which she had to escape, Chase was really good in those penultimate moments. Teyana Taylor played the part of Perfidia with the required unapologetic energy. Benicio del Toro and Regina Hall chip in with some memorable character roles.

One Battle After Another is a slow-burning thriller that sets up the plot in an interesting way. While the backdrop building consumes a lot of time, there is humor that makes the series of events engaging for the viewers. With a thrilling showdown and a tail end that mocks the right-wing ideologies, Paul Thomas Anderson creates an elaborate drama with his One Battle After Another.