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      <title>Comments On: It&apos;s a gusher!
    
      by Pat Graham</title>
      <link>http://www.chicagoreader.com/TheBlog/archives/2008/01/30/its-gusher</link>
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      by Pat Graham</description>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.chicagoreader.com/TheBlog/archives/2008/01/30/its-gusher/#970233]]></link>
    
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    <author><![CDATA[pat g.]]></author>
    <description>
      
      <![CDATA[HOMO S.--o come onnnnnnnn! ... and what czech beer was that?
        
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          Posted by pat g.]]>
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    <pubDate>Fri, 22 Feb 2008 18:51:05 -0600</pubDate> 
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.chicagoreader.com/TheBlog/archives/2008/01/30/its-gusher/#954700]]></link>
    
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    <author><![CDATA[homo superior]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[JRJ: Thanks for pointing out the difference between "crappy" and "less crappy." Perhaps in _someone's_ life that means something. I really don't want to imagine that life, however. And somehow I don't think you have that life, either. 
    
    But really: I'm given a choice of watching Road Trip again, or The Dreamers. RT makes me smile; TD makes me think Berto really wishes  Michael Pitt's dick were hard in those shots, but he's too much of a closeted homo[phobe] to admit it. Berto's been getting fucked up the ass and refusing to come since at least Last Tango (I stole that) and sorry, I'd rather come. Guess I've made my choices.
    
    And Pat, as much as I love your contrarian, endlessly inventive criticism, your prose sucks, and not in a good way. Go study Orwell, fer fuck's sake. 
    
    On second thought, I don't need BSG, I need Female Trouble. 
    
    Don't we all?
        
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          Posted by homo superior]]>
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    <pubDate>Fri, 22 Feb 2008 18:02:16 -0600</pubDate> 
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.chicagoreader.com/TheBlog/archives/2008/01/30/its-gusher/#968189]]></link>
    
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    <author><![CDATA[homo superior]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[HELP even. Sorry, full of Czech beer. I will now watch some Battlestar Galactica pirated from the Internets. Goddess bless 'em.
        
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          Posted by homo superior]]>
    </description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 22 Feb 2008 17:31:05 -0600</pubDate> 
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.chicagoreader.com/TheBlog/archives/2008/01/30/its-gusher/#962058]]></link>
    
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    <author><![CDATA[homo superior]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[I live in hope that the experience of watching a film, and that of making one, is, oh, about a billion times more interesting, rewarding, enduring, satisfying than the criticism I've just waded through here. 
    
    Good night, all, I think I'll go masturbate. No, really, masturbate, with consummation and closure and all that. I might even have some helop. That's more than any of you will find here.
        
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          Posted by homo superior]]>
    </description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 22 Feb 2008 17:29:01 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.chicagoreader.com/TheBlog/archives/2008/01/30/its-gusher/#964606]]></link>
    
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    <author><![CDATA[brian]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[supernova? ahem. he's a white dwarf at best. and the intentionality you're assigning to Anderson doesn't really match up with the recasting of the role referenced upthread. or address that he's written just as poorly as he's played. i know and approve the strategy you're talking about, it's indeed what makes eyes wide shut secretly awesome, but i think you're reading it in here.
        
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          Posted by brian]]>
    </description>
    <pubDate>Wed, 20 Feb 2008 18:40:32 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.chicagoreader.com/TheBlog/archives/2008/01/30/its-gusher/#968620]]></link>
    
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    <author><![CDATA[pat g.]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[BRIAN--finally, a straight man to feed me the line i've been waiting for! ... since if you see p.t. anderson's manipulation of actors the way i do--like a semisadistic swimming instructor in high school who throws you into the pool and watches you flail around a bit, gasping for buoyancy and air, the ultimate example of learning by doing--dano's coarse, frantic, in-over-his-head ingenuousness is actually the BEST thing in the movie: "here's your character, now play it!" ... with no help at all from the controlling maestro * so out come all the stops, willy-nilly, with dano exploiting every actor's trick he knows (as well as some he doesn't)--like poor emily watson in PUNCH-DRUNK LOVE, stuck with having to love the congenitally unlovable sandler ... her ultimate failure the movie's ultimate success * arguably dano contra day-lewis does something like that: all that polished versatility, that technical intelligence, against this sputtering supernova of a performer who hasn't the slightest clue * spontaneity without the safety net: at least part of the movie's genius ...
    
    incidentally: kubrick tried the same kind of trick at least twice, in BARRY LYNDON and EYES WIDE SHUT (jury's still out on THE SHINING), with swirling theatrical bravura surrounding a gaping black hole at the center, the main formal/aesthetic dynamic in both * saved by ineptitude, especially in cruise's case--i'd argue something similar's at work in BLOOD
        
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          Posted by pat g.]]>
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    <pubDate>Wed, 20 Feb 2008 13:08:30 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[brian]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[afraid i'm with kifah and the haters, pat. dano's preacher character in "there will be blood" as written and played and shot is a complete failure, dooming the film. one reason why "assassination" is better.
        
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          Posted by brian]]>
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    <pubDate>Tue, 19 Feb 2008 20:32:44 -0600</pubDate> 
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.chicagoreader.com/TheBlog/archives/2008/01/30/its-gusher/#961593]]></link>
    
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    <author><![CDATA[Kifah Foutah]]></author>
    <description>
      
      <![CDATA[If this movie truly develops "Legs", it'll certainly be running the relay race in the cinematic special Olympics.
        
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          Posted by Kifah Foutah]]>
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    <pubDate>Fri, 15 Feb 2008 03:07:45 -0600</pubDate> 
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[pat g.]]></author>
    <description>
      
      <![CDATA[KIFAH--don't know about making the movies any "better" but these kinds of considerations obviously affect how we see them--make the experience a bit more resonant and fuller than otherwise * and i've gone on about BLOOD not because it's a "masterpiece" (see my response to DALE WITTIG's comment above) but for associations elicited, questions raised, "creative" riddles implied * which inevitably contribute to any definition of "great," "masterpiece," etc, we might invent--except all of that stuff's still a good way down the road * but if certain suggestions/associations do eventually catch on, become part of the standard discourse, you might say they've developed "legs" ... as of course would be true of the movie itself
        
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          Posted by pat g.]]>
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    <pubDate>Thu, 14 Feb 2008 15:31:24 -0600</pubDate> 
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[Kifah Foutah]]></author>
    <description>
      
      <![CDATA[Watch Higher Learning again. That interpretation is just as valid as anything you've laid out, but alas I don't think it makes the movie(s) any better. Create criticisms are fun to read, but seldom do they actually illuminate much of anything (particularly in movies that aren't that great to begin with). 
    
    Which ultimately is my big point. If you are still maintaining that the film is no masterpiece, than is it worth the energy writing about it as if it was? (which, like it or not, you are doing).
        
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          Posted by Kifah Foutah]]>
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    <pubDate>Mon, 11 Feb 2008 01:01:23 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[pat g.]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[KIFAH--except i won't, because i don't think those things--to invoke sarris again, we make our arguments and hope that the case stands up ...
        
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          Posted by pat g.]]>
    </description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 08 Feb 2008 19:07:59 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[Kifah Foutah]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[I'm calling shenanigans on that right now. Next thing you know you'll be saying that Lawrence Fishburne is adding subliminal resonance of Frederick Douglas in Higher Learning.....or is that George Clooney sending off alarm bells of black Irish immigrant assimilation in Attack Of the Killer Tomatoes?
        
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          Posted by Kifah Foutah]]>
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    <pubDate>Fri, 08 Feb 2008 18:36:29 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[pat g.]]></author>
    <description>
      
      <![CDATA[TONY--not the one to ask since i don't do long (ho-ho), though perhaps the hint of an answer is in  the READER's capsule summary: just click on the link in the post--the problem starts to reveal itself there ...
        
        <br />
        
          Posted by pat g.]]>
    </description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 08 Feb 2008 10:47:21 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[pat g.]]></author>
    <description>
      
      <![CDATA[KIFAH--re "Why don't we just jerk off everyone who uses Paul Dano's face in mainstream outlets since its so unconventional" ...
    
    because no one else is using the face (actually, STUDYING it's more the case here) in remotely similar ways
    
    "Does Anderson make any real attempt to explore how these cultural alarm bells are set off?"
    
    obviously no, since it's intended (assuming, of course, there's anything to intend!) to work connotatively, as a subliminal resonance, not something you'd ever address directly--how, e.g., david lynch uses laura dern ... though plz note: i'm NOT now saying that anderson's impersonating lynch!
        
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          Posted by pat g.]]>
    </description>
    <pubDate>Fri, 08 Feb 2008 10:34:23 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <link><![CDATA[http://www.chicagoreader.com/TheBlog/archives/2008/01/30/its-gusher/#967738]]></link>
    
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    <author><![CDATA[tony paley]]></author>
    <description>
      
      <![CDATA[I don't take particular notice of reviewers here in the genertal newspapers apart from Jonathan Romney in the Independent on Sunday. My first port of call is your newspaper. But The Guardian has given There Will Be Blood maximum stars. So has The Independent. This film is going to be the most talked-about film of the year. I ask again &acirc;&#128;&#148; why no long review for this movie?
        
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          Posted by tony paley]]>
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    <pubDate>Fri, 08 Feb 2008 05:14:06 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[Kfoutah]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[Correction *our not so humble director, and "in more also"? scratch the first two words. jeez.
        
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          Posted by Kfoutah]]>
    </description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 07 Feb 2008 20:47:31 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
    <link><![CDATA[http://www.chicagoreader.com/TheBlog/archives/2008/01/30/its-gusher/#969295]]></link>
    
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    <author><![CDATA[Kifah Foutah]]></author>
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      <![CDATA["since within the historical frame of the source novel, the idea of physiognomy as key to character (see, e.g., william rimmer's notorious artists' anatomy text) was still very much vogue, and a face like dano's--especially in profile--would've set cultural alarm bells ringing: not an "evolved"/intelligent anglo type, more subhuman actually, like the immigrant irish, etc * it's dano's face/presence that's one of anderson's little opacities, in the way it strikes a balance, mentality-wise, between now and then: why this actor, so physiologically unconventional for a contemporary "mainstream" movie role? * are we channeling obsolescence or what? "
    
    Given that are not so humble director is on the record as saying that he "is a bad reader" and "can't remember the things I read" I find it highly unlikely that he would be taking matters of physiognomy in relation to history into account. A close examination of "Oil" I think more than illustrates that Anderson merely used the book for practical oil lingo and setting purposes only and that he used the backdrop to interject his lame daddy issues riddled story line into it. 
    
    Also could the same thing be said of Paul Dano's appearance in Little Miss Sunshine? or his layout in GQ this past month? Why don't we just jerk off everyone who uses Paul Dano's face in mainstream outlets since its so "unconventional".
    
    Also I would add, at least in terms of how he films close ups, they're done in the same way he's done them in all of his films (which is rather hideous to look at to my eyes). He merely aims the camera down slightly cutting off the subjects forehead leaving the chin in the middle of the frame, with more empty space surrounding it than anyone would care to look at. I find nothing particular about that.
    
    In more also- "a face like dano's--especially in profile--would've set cultural alarm bells ringing: not an "evolved"/intelligent anglo type, more subhuman actually, like the immigrant irish, etc *
    
    Lets say thats true. Does Anderson make any real attempt to explore how these cultural alarm bells are set off? is there any galvanization between Dano and the citizens of the town? I'd say not.
        
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          Posted by Kifah Foutah]]>
    </description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 07 Feb 2008 20:44:34 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <author><![CDATA[tony paley]]></author>
    <description>
      
      <![CDATA[Over here in Britain this film is getting rave reviews. Time Out London and Derek Malcolm in London's Evening Standard (both influential) have hailed it as a masterpiece and that's before my paper's Film & Music section (The Guardian) hits the streets tomorrow. There's been a buzz about this film since the autumn. The point I want to make is: why was this film not considered interesting enough for a long review? I was looking forward to an extended discussion of the film's merits &acirc;&#128;&#148; surely it must be one of the films, no matter how good or bad, that your readership will want to see this year.
        
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          Posted by tony paley]]>
    </description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 07 Feb 2008 15:16:51 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[pat g.]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[ZS--couple random thoughts: look how paul dano's face is used, beginning with the extended take in profile early on, where you get the high, blank forehead, the receding jaw that regathers itself in the small jut of a chin, etc * and later the shots full-on, that give you a big, improbable moon as contrast to the angularity * you're meant to NOTICE these things, the length of the shots tells you as much, and their effects don't fit the allegorical model you're after ... except maybe they do, but in unanticipated ways * since within the historical frame of the source novel, the idea of physiognomy as key to character (see, e.g., william rimmer's notorious artists' anatomy text) was still very much vogue, and a face like dano's--especially in profile--would've set cultural alarm bells ringing: not an "evolved"/intelligent anglo type, more subhuman actually, like the immigrant irish, etc * it's dano's face/presence that's one of anderson's little opacities, in the way it strikes a balance, mentality-wise, between now and then: why this actor, so physiologically unconventional for a contemporary "mainstream" movie role? * are we channeling obsolescence or what?
    
    also the shooting style, the way scenes incrementally evolve, which already i've alluded to in the post--e.g., buckboard traveling in long shot, then ever so gradually a townscape creeping in from the right, building by clapboard building * the conventional way of doing this usually involves several edits: medium shot of wagon, close-up of driver, approach to town from driver's-seat perspective, etc * partly it's straight stroheim classicism anderson's giving--e.g., the distance of the figures vis-a-vis their determinist/naturalistic context--partly an allusion to frontier photos of the 1890s, from colorado mining camps, etc * but all of it eschews the way commercial films are typically shot today * so: are we channeling again or not?
    
    as for day-lewis: a big, barnstorming presence that's more about virtuosity and color, an extravagant connotative pastiche, than anything so literal as you're describing--all of which is perfectly fine by me ...
        
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          Posted by pat g.]]>
    </description>
    <pubDate>Thu, 07 Feb 2008 14:15:51 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[ZS]]></author>
    <description>
      
      <![CDATA[You don't think There Will Be Blood was made, in part, to respond to the current political climate in the US? 
    
    I think the question that is nagging you is correct. Why bother with the material that is frankly out of date? There is nothing in the film that leads me to believe that it isn't a generic  political critique dressed up with some film-school tricks, none of which are that distancing anyway, at least any that are comparable to what Barry Lyndon does where literally the camera zooms out to distance us from Barry. 
    
    And the point about will isn't about a one-to one- reading exactly. It's about how the films use their characters as history. Plainview seems an utterly conventional character, both in his psychology and in Lewis performance, in which case it is There Will Be Blood that is offering a one to one relationship between history and character will much more than either The Assassination of Jesse James or Barry Lyndon.
        
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          Posted by ZS]]>
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    <pubDate>Wed, 06 Feb 2008 20:28:48 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[pat g.]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[ZS--unfortunately, films do more than illustrate theses, and insofar as ASSASSINATION serves up a character who "can't ... find a way to exert his own will" whereas BLOOD does the opposite, i'm probably not interested in either * but do consider i've spent the better part of the post arguing AGAINST the kind of one-to-one reading you support, as if upton sinclair's wheezy hectoring somehow represented the film's point of view (rather than anderson's "tightrope" distance from it, half in the mind-set, half out) * since if the primary "voice" isn't the filmmaker's but the original author's, what happens to "transparency" then? * muddier and muddier, i think ...
    
    which is why i dragged in BARRY LYNDON and rivette, as examples of distancing strategies in action--a point i've already admitted to stretching a bit * and still the point needs making, since if not, why bother with this half-forgotten, out-of-date material at all?
        
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          Posted by pat g.]]>
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    <pubDate>Wed, 06 Feb 2008 19:36:26 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[ZS]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[Well, I think for one thing it is far more intelligent about how American myths are made, and how film images (since the film openly declares its own artifice)help construct those myths. 
    
    I find the character of Bob Ford far more interesting than Planview.  Planview is really just the cliche of the self-made capitalist American male who makes history by forcing his will into things. Bob Ford, on the other hand, can't really find a way to exert his own will. Even through killing Jesse James he doesn't achieve any individuality. 
    
    In that regard, Jesse James reminded much more of Barry Lyndon than There Will Be Blood: its characters can never escape from     history, myth, and as their status  as images in a film frame. I think There Will Be Blood tries to hard   to make allegory out of its limited  understanding of American history and frontier capitalism. To disagree with a point raised earlier, this film really is just transparent.
        
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          Posted by ZS]]>
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    <pubDate>Wed, 06 Feb 2008 16:59:24 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[pat g.]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[ZS--now there's one i don't understand at all, eyes glazing over, etc ... chacun a son gout, i guess
        
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          Posted by pat g.]]>
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    <pubDate>Wed, 06 Feb 2008 10:35:05 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <title><![CDATA[Re: It's a gusher!]]></title>
    
    
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    <author><![CDATA[ZS]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[Slightly off topic. I finally caught up with The Assassination of Jesse James. I thought it was brilliant and  far more interesting than There Will Be Blood.
        
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          Posted by ZS]]>
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    <pubDate>Wed, 06 Feb 2008 02:55:04 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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    <author><![CDATA[kifah]]></author>
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      <![CDATA[I definitely see what you're saying. I guess at the end of the day I don't find his films interesting enough as cinema to get into them, and I just don't find them mysterious enough to admire them. Not that I hate him in principle per say. I think Hard Eight is a very good film, And I at least find moments of Boogie Nights, Magnolia and Punch Drunk Love funny, if nothing else. It seems that Anderson's strong points (as I see them) are better suited for projects of smaller scale and ambition. The things in his movies that I generally enjoy I definitely found lacking, but even if it wasn't I doubt I'd respect the movie any more. I find him pretentious but at the same time this has hurled at any number of my favorite filmmakers, so to each his own.
        
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          Posted by kifah]]>
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    <pubDate>Tue, 05 Feb 2008 01:46:28 -0600</pubDate> 
    <source url="http://www.chicagoreader.com">Chicago Reader</source>
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