Paul Thomas Anderson’s “One Battle After Another” has generated a lot of buzz ever since its late-September release, with just about everyone in Hollywood hailing it as a masterpiece.
Following burnt-out revolutionary Bob Ferguson (Leonardo DiCaprio) as he stumbles his way to save his daughter Willa (Chase Infiniti) in a time of immigration and political unrest under threat of the scheming Colonel Lockjaw (Sean Penn), this film dabbles in action, comedy and political extremes.
With a sweeping 95% critics’ score and an admirable 85% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, it is quickly being denoted as “awe-inspiring” and built up as a “towering achievement.”
Does the film truly deserve these accolades? Not exactly.
During the first act, I found myself incredibly frustrated and disappointed. The script felt tonally dissonant, trying hard to balance between humor and politics. It’s a hard match to make between those two while skirting the line of inoffensive, and oftentimes films will jab at certain sides while cowering from the other in hopes that they don’t go too far. The first act felt a bit like this to me, with silly names denoting serious characters who deal in political aggression.
I was frustrated with the lack of motivation for activism that the film seemed so desperate to preach. I was ready to tear into this movie during that first act, and became increasingly angry at the uneven script … then the second act started.
The second act, to me, is unimpeachable. I was suddenly laughing, almost to tears at points, at the utter ridiculousness of everything. If the script were a deer, then the first act was it stumbling to walk after birth, but the second act had it bounding over highway guardrails. It understood itself, became more confident in its identity and took every single jab it could at everyone on either side of the political fence. The hilarious names matched equally bizarre characters and organizations. Each set piece was fluidly paced one after another, and the momentum never ceased with a score from Jonny Greenwood that ran on like never-ending jazzy improvisation. I began to see why everyone loved it as much as they said.
The third act was serviceable. It was a good finale that rode a little on the coattails of the second act, but created a sense of completion to all the storylines that had been built up over a lengthy two hours and forty minutes. And when I left the theater, I realized that this was a film that everyone should see. It mocks the modern political landscape while still presenting serious issues, and I believe that the person who sits next to you in the theater will have a different outcome than you did when it’s all done.
Should you see it on the largest screen, like everyone is saying? No, you don’t have to. You could wait until it comes out and probably have just as much of an enjoyable time. But should you see it at all? Yes. It is a satire that marks the decade and should even be watched years down the road when hopefully some of these issues are resolved. And pay attention to Sean Penn, who plays Colonel Lockjaw. He’d better win some awards for this one.