One Battle After Another hits theaters this Thursday, the 25th, and it’s only natural to want to bring some order to the director’s filmography, Paul Thomas Anderson. What does he like to talk about? Which themes matter most to him? After all, with just a quick glance, the American has already tackled cults, the porn industry, teen romances, and even the emerging oil industry. But that’s just the surface: Paul Thomas Anderson is always watching society, and above all, how the past shapes (and burdens) people and their lives.
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In this film, that perspective doesn’t change. Anderson begins by focusing on a guerrilla group fighting to free immigrants unjustly imprisoned in the United States. Perfidy (Teyana Taylor) is the tough one in a gang full of personality. Meanwhile, demolition expert rookie “Ghetto Pat” (Leonardo DiCaprio) tries to prove his worth. From there, a relationship blossoms and, later, a daughter who is overprotected by her father.
One Battle After Another: a film of imperfect characters
The villain of this flawed hero — “Ghetto Pat,” or simply Bob, as he’s later called — is the bizarre Colonel Steven J. Lockjaw (Sean Penn). A strange, hard-nosed military man with some unexpected fetishes, he becomes hopelessly infatuated with Perfidy, despite his mission to stop her. This complicated relationship spills into a clear obsession, with these characters inevitably chasing each other down.
“I don’t think about making a movie that directly talks to another one. But inevitably you carry everything you’ve seen and loved. It’s like an echo that appears in the images, sometimes without realizing it,” the filmmaker said during a press conference attended by Filmelier.
And that’s exactly the feeling that comes with One Battle After Another. PTA, in every way, seeks to understand society and the past. The focus is on ideology, politics, and the sense of helplessness — and how that changes over time, even reflected through family relationships. It’s hard not to recall Brazilian singer-songwriter Belchior (“My pain is to realize / That despite having done / Everything, everything, everything, everything we did / We are still the same / And we live / We are still the same / And we live / Just like our parents”). Everything remains the same, and PTA doesn’t know how to deal with it.
Midway through the film, One Battle After Another takes a significant time jump. Everything changes in Bob/Ghetto Pat’s life. His wife is gone, he raises his daughter alone, and he must hide from Lockjaw. Yet it’s striking how little around him has changed. The settings look the same, and there are few new conveniences — cell phones barely appear, nor does much other technology. The world is barren, and backward ideas remain unchanged.
A world going in circles
Was Bob and Perfidy’s fight in vain? Did society lose? Paul Thomas Anderson isn’t interested in answers, but rather in putting feelings on screen about how things behave (and will behave in the future). Does ideology vanish, transform? Can it continue? Is there continuity in a social struggle like this?
It’s interesting to feel that the story never stops happening — everything is moving all the time, but also frozen in the air. Things move forward in One Battle After Another, but at the same time remain static. It’s not as if it moves backward, but rather as if everything is stuck. It’s also tempting to box the film in: is it drama, thriller, pure action? It’s all of that and none of it.
The cast also deserves the spotlight. DiCaprio is at his best since The Wolf of Wall Street. Deliciously exaggerated, weird, funny in an almost uncomfortable way. “What attracted me [to the role] was the humanity of the character. He seems like a classic hero, but in reality he’s flawed, he can’t even remember a password. His true strength lies in protecting his daughter,” he said at the press event. “The Big Lebowski was an influence. Also Dog Day Afternoon, with Pacino’s fanaticism to save the ones he loves.”
Sean Penn, the standout of One Battle After Another
But the absolute highlight is Sean Penn — who, let’s be honest, might as well already have the Best Supporting Actor Oscar in his hands. He perfectly follows the bizarre tone of it all, like an obsessed man who doesn’t quite understand how or why.
“[PTA] doesn’t ask you to build something artificial. He asks you to find the rhythm already on the page and then adjust the energy. More intensity here, more calm there,” said the actor. “There was urgency in every scene. It wasn’t just about what the character said, but how he moved, how he occupied the space. I had to keep that constant pulse.”
Thus, One Battle After Another is everything one would expect from a filmmaker like Paul Thomas Anderson: a powerful film, a desperate look at today’s complexities, a scream of fear with a laugh at the end. It’s the example of a complete film that knows how to tackle the world’s chaos. Be it yesterday, today, or tomorrow. It’s PTA exactly as everyone wanted.
