It’s hardly a piping hot take to say that Paul Thomas Anderson has not made a bad film.
From his breakout second feature Boogie Nights to his misunderstood romantic comedy Phantom Thread, via the Oscar-winning There Will Be Blood and the Silver Lion-nabbing The Master, the American filmmaker has consistently proven that he’s in a league of his own. And whether you pick Punch-Drunk Love or Licorice Pizza as your least favourite entry in his filmography, his ‘weakest’ would still top other directors’ screen credits.
So, it will come as a shock to no one that his tenth feature, One Battle After Another, continues the impressive winning streak.
What it does do, however, is answer the question: “What if we gave one of the most talented filmmakers out there a blockbuster-sized budget and let him shoot the absolute shit out of The Big Lebowski-meets-Mission: Impossible?”
Get ready for a very satisfying answer.
Loosely inspired by the postmodern countercultural novel “Vineland”, One Battle After Another is PTA’s second adaptation of the notoriously reclusive and infamously hard-to-adapt novelist Thomas Pynchon – following the thrilling Inherent Vice. And there are parallels to be drawn with the ambitous 2014 stoner detective opus; except this one feels tighter.
The story starts on the Mexican border, where radical vigilante group The French 75 launch a raid on a migrant detention centre. Among the group’s members are explosives expert “Ghetto” Pat Calhoun (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his impassioned girlfriend Perfidia Beverly Hills (Teyana Taylor).
The op goes according to plan, but sees Perfidia corner the camp’s commander, Colonel Steven J. Lockjaw (Sean Penn). She leaves an impression on him. And his crotch.
A chain of events, which shan’t be spoiled here, sees Lockjaw arrest Perfidia, who rats out her group. She then disappears, leaving Pat and their young baby daughter behind.
Fast-forward 16 years, and Pat – now Bob Ferguson – is no longer the revolutionary he once was. He’s gone down the Jeffrey “The Dude” Lebowski route, his mind progressively fried by copious amounts of tweezer-held doobies. The dishevelled single dad’s daughter Willa (Chase Infiniti) is doing better – except she has to deal with her father’s paranoid rants and no phones rule.
Except it’s not paranoia if they’re really after you, as Bob is vindicated when Lockjaw re-enters their lives. The once emasculated and still mesmerized military man is hellbent on finding Willa, and Bob needs to get his act together in order to protect her. That includes remembering the revolutionary greeting codes.
For reasons which become all too apparent once you dive into PTA’s modern American epic, that’s all the plot synopsis that should be allowed. Nevermind how martial arts Sensei Sergio St. Carlos (Benicio del Toro), the holy sisters of the Brave Beaver, Comrade Josh who feels his revolutionary space is being violated and a secret society of white supremacists obsessed with “native sons” and Saint Nick fit into all of this madness… You’ll have to head to the cinema to find out.
Trust us: it’s the best money you’ll spend at the talkies this year. Not just because One Battle After Another features some terrific performances (Chase Infiniti in her first feature roll is a revelation, while Sean Penn and his Tom Waits-pitched timbre steals the show), looks incredible (thank you VistaVision) and sounds superb (courtesy of Jonny Greenwood, signing his fifth PTA score), but because PTA achieves something uniquely unclassifiable.
It’s a paranoid and propulsive thriller, whose frantic pace is a joy to experience.
It’s a stoner adventure with Chaplin-esque slapstick and a sense of humour that never feels forced when it’s not busy hitting all its marks.
It’s a zany Dr. Strangelove-like farce about those who seek “purity” but end up as hilarious caricatures of power-hungry, virility-straining buffoons we are subjected to on a daily basis on the news.
It’s a criticism of power structures, doubling up as a reminder that those who are the most radical can often be the most cowardly; that good-intentioned idealists may not always practice what they preach; and that those trying to be strongmen are actually weak.
It’s an incisive yet never hectoring look at a divided America – not just limited to Trump’s but heavily inspired by its current supremacist excesses – where right-wing and leftist extremism are two sides of the same coin, both indicating that heartlessness will be our undoing.
And beyond its rallying cry against dogmatism in all its forms, it’s a moving and humanistic tale about a bath-robed dad having a terrible day, trying his level best to protect his teenage daughter from inheriting his past.
It’s deep. It’s light. In short, it’s a modern classic.
“Make it good. Make it bright. Impress me,” Perfidia orders Pat during their Mexico mission. PTA’s ticked all three boxes.
So, Viva la Revolución, down with the Christmas Adventurers, and get thee to a cinema. In doing so, you’ll get to watch one of 2025’s most unmissable theatrical offerings and send a message of your own to those bankrolling daring and entertaining cinema like PTA’s bravura filmmaking: More of this please.
One Battle After Another is out in cinemas now.