For those of you wondering just what the hell this movie's about (the trailer is less than enlightening), it's a journey through thirty years in the life of a Texas oil man (Daniel Day Lewis): how he rises from a one-man operation to a wealthy success, his relationship to the community and church where his major wells are, his relationship (or lack thereof) to his family...  But beyond all that, it's a glance into the ideological breach between capitalism and the church in a fledgling industrial America.

PT Anderson is a talented filmmaker.  Furthermore, his career is managed so brilliantly that one has to tip hat.  He makes two pictures a decade, and somehow manages to create a deafening buzz about them prior to their release.  How he accomplishes this feat is a mystery, as his films are a bit too eccentric for the average movie-goer, and are all very long-winded.

One might say that PT Anderson is a director of literature.  His films watch with the symbolism of an accredited novel.  One might also say that he is the Ayn Rand of film world - a capable and intelligent critic, but one whose process insults the intelligence of the majority of the community; watching his films are like being pummeled with a blunt object.  And one could say further still that the critics' overwhelming positive reaction to Anderson's films is very much a case of the emperor's new clothes; they are so out there that the reviewer who attacks them fears accusations of being too unintelligent to have understood.

All that said, There Will Be Blood has moments of genius.  Had Anderson exercised a little restraint and left twenty or so minutes on the editing floor, he'd have a fantastic film.  But his tendency to Ayn-Rand us leaves a taste of "Shut up already" in our mouths, and ultimately weakens his own point.

Day Lewis, of course, carries the film - and does so with his usual mad genius.  Jonny Greenwood's score is prickly and bold, out of place at times in a way that really draws attention to what's happening.  Anderson's direction is straightforward and unobtrusive when not prattling on for twice the time necessary to make the point, and his script is carefully structured.  I just wish he'd have exercised some restraint and omitted the last thirteen vignettes of Dagny & Taggart's struggles with incompetence.  The first twelve said it cleanly.