Review of There Will Be Blood (2007) by Metaflix I — 16 Jul 2017

Paul Thomas Anderson's 'There Will Be Blood' deservingly won 2 Oscars and was nominated for 6 more.

Daniel Day-Lewis was given an entire year to prepare for the role of Daniel Plainview and it shows. Even more incredible is the fact that Paul Dano was given just 4 days (!) to prepare for his breakout role as Eli Sunday after he was originally cast to just play the smaller part of Paul Sunday (the script was quickly re-written to make the brothers twins so that Dano could pull double duty).

While the Oscar for Day-Lewis' performance is a no-brainer, the other--for cinematography--is actually quite debatable. Sure, the Texas locations and landscapes were quite remarkable, but there were also plenty of times when the images on the screen were unnecessarily dark. I would've preferred if the film won the Oscar for best sound editing (for which it was indeed nominated) as the use of sound--including distinct moments of silence--heightened the overall viewing experience to an even greater degree.