Firstly I should state that I have always been something of a fan of Paul Thomas Anderson, from Boogie Nights, Magnolia, through to Punch Drunk Love, and so expected that "There Will Be Blood" would be as brilliant as its reputation heralded. So I was very surprised at my immense disappointment.

The film starts off well enough, with the famous 15 minute sans-dialogue sequence about Daniel Plainview's tribulations, and eventual triumphs spanning his early years of prospecting and oil drilling. The beautiful cinematography vividly captures the hardship and danger of the early days of oil exploration, and conveys a fascination with the now antique methods of oil extraction. Had the film continued in this fashion it would truly have been a masterpiece, paying due respect to the rugged individualists and visionaries that took the risks to help create one of the essential pillars of modern civilisation.

Sadly as the characters start to speak, the film slowly and inexorably drifts into multiple melodramatic sub-plots that neither go anywhere of interest, nor add up to anything by the end. Such as Plainview buys a plot of land from the Sunday family, and after some hard bargaining Plainview agrees to a contract where he not only buys their land, but also gives $5,000 to the local church, headed by one of the family members, Ely. Ely Sunday from this point becomes Plainview's primary antagonist, albeit for reasons that are difficult to comprehend.

For no discernible reason, Plainview fails to pay the $5,000 due to the local church as stipulated in the contract, and similarly for no discernible reason he roughs Ely up when he demands the money. Rather than going to court for breach of contract, and jeopardising not only Plainview's entire investment, but also his standing in this solidly religious community whose goodwill he requires to carry out his ambitions, Ely Sunday thinks that perhaps it's a better idea to screech and flap his arms about demons and miracles for the next few years.

This strategy proves to be little more than a passing annoyance for Plainview, as he has quite a few other meandering sub-plots to deal with, which I shall get to soon. Ely wins a small victory over Plainview when one essential block of land that he hasn't bought yet is owned by a member of Ely's church, and will only sell if he gets baptised. This leads into a rather preposterous scene where Plainview prostrates himself in Ely's church, and is supposed to be something of an embarrassment to Plainview. At least up till this point Plainview does not seem to be an atheist, but more indifferent to the matter, as his drive to create his oil business leaves little room for such questions. So it does not follow logically that this abasement should be anything more than a minor episode as far as Plainview is concerned.

But I am getting ahead of myself here, other things happen too. Such as Plainview has an adopted son, who loses his hearing in an accident. Not only does he become deaf, but seemingly also mute, mentally retarded, and a pyromaniac who tries to burn his father to death while sleeping. Plainview understandably won't put up with being burned to death in his sleep, decides to put the errant boy in a home for deaf children, and the film regards this as a very terrible thing to do to the young Norman Bates.

Plainview's hitherto unknown step-brother also turns up, but later turns out to be an imposter, for which Plainview murders him, digging a grave that is not only several feet too long, but several feet too shallow. Apparently Plainview is a bit of a serial killer, as is the custom for captains of industry, and in the final scene of the film he decides to murder Ely Sunday, for no absolutely reason whatsoever. A bunch of other stuff happened too, but I have already forgotten it all.

Given that the film itself is of little interest, the last remaining task is to speculate as to why it was received with near unanimous critical acclaim. My guess is that as the film mentions oil, capitalism, and religion, albeit without saying anything much about any of them, it touched upon a few topical nerves and critics fancied that the film was somehow a commentary on Bush, Cheney, war in the Middle-East, and Republican fundamentalists. And I recall at the time of the film's release various internet-atheists were doing cartwheels about the supposed attack on 'superstitious Christian idiots' contained within. But no reading of the film unequivocally supports any of this, such as it is just as easy to interpret Plainview's murder of Ely Sunday as an example of the crazed anger and fanaticism of professional atheists like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens. And one of Plainview's other antagonists, Standard Oil, could clearly see that he was a fruitloop, so it's not like the oil business is inherently crazy or unscrupulous.

So the lesson here is if you want to be a hit with the critics, just vaguely allude to newsworthy topics in such a way that allows them to project whatever significance they like into it.

One of the missed opportunities of “There Will Be Blood” is to examine the obsessive psychology that often goes with major success in business, which is generally not motivated by a desire for money. But to do this insightfully requires a subtlety the script simply does not have.

Regretfully I give this zero stars. Good acting and cinematography counts for absolutely nothing with a script this bad.

I enjoyed "There will be blood" a lot. The music, Composed by Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead fame was fantastic. It really set the mood perfectly.
Daniel Lewis deserved his oscar award, his performance was very focused and i imagine it would have been emotionally taxing playing that role.
I was left feeling quite uneasy after the film, a very intense journey.
I give it 4/5.