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One Battle After Another Answers the Zeitgeist to the Most Visceral, Enthralling Degree

It’s always another battle, isn’t it?
Paul Thomas Anderson’s One Battle After Another was written, produced, and shot in an era when the fight and pressure had died down to do something about the American immigration crisis, to end the immoral detentions of so many migrants and families. The Biden years weren’t terribly distinct from the Trump years to those who paid attention and suffered through the horrors of ICE, which Biden never disbanded. But it was a moral battle not taken up, and it is perhaps for that reason the draconian crackdown we are living through currently was allowed to flourish. And this movie arrives in a moment where it feels so timely. It would always have been timely though -the fight does not end.
Still it feels extremely pertinent. I’ve come across a lot of disbelief from critics that One Battle After Another was allowed to be made in the context it was -a studio production with the highest budget Anderson has ever worked with in service of a story that is explicitly political in a way that the executives in their cowardice typically work hard to avoid. And yes, that is a pretty stunning thing and worth honing in on. But at the same time this movie really could not have been made at a better time, even had it been contemporaneous to when Thomas Pynchon published the novel Vineland in 1990, which it is loosely adapted from. Because what the movie speaks to now, its overhanging themes, have not been more important than in the present when they are so intently top of mind and in some cases under attack.
You see, One Battle After Another is fundamentally about a mixed-race teenage girl in danger by virtue of her identity from an arm of the U.S. government. Its protagonists are militant revolutionary leftists while its antagonists are white supremacists within the leadership of the military -specifically border enforcement agents. And though each group is drawn with some satirical commentary, it is crystal clear in where moral alignment lies. The film doesn’t specify exactly its timeline, though unlike Steal Away (a movie this film has a lot in common with in fact), it is clearly a generic approximation of modern America -as things open on the group known as the French 75 attacking and liberating an immigration detention centre on the California-Mexico border. Ghetto Pat Calhoun (Leonardo DiCaprio) and Perfidia Beverly Hills (Teyana Taylor) are part of this collective and they become romantically involved and eventually have a child. But the sexual obsession of one fascist Captain Lockjaw (Sean Penn) towards Perfidia and her own complex relationship to him results in betrayal and Perfidia’s disappearance. Sixteen years later, Pat lives under the name of Bob Ferguson in a sanctuary city with his daughter Willa (Chase Infiniti) who is targeted by Lockjaw -all three becoming embroiled in an elaborate pursuit.
Putting aside the film’s politics and implications for a moment, adapting this Pynchon book was a passion project of Anderson’s, and the enthusiasm with which he takes to it is palpable. This is some of his most thrilling direction in decades, exciting in the way that Boogie Nights or Punch-Drunk-Love are. His blocking is so precise and he shows it off through a series of impressive long takes in which many things are happening at once but in perfect sync with what the scene demands. The prologue acting as its own miniature story, it is fairly early on into the main plot that Willa is put in danger, and the tension and urgency that begins here never lets up -in fact Anderson experiments with just how far he can carry it without breaking, either for a new scene or new point-of-view; it turns out it is pretty far, his compelling consistent visuals in concert with the performances, a stupendously paced script that balances both danger and humour, and an infectious piano motif by Jonny Greenwood that feels akin to a Henry Mancini score from the 1960s. This music and pacing largely carries through across three perspectives, and feels fitting for each one.
It is appropriate also to the film's tone, which oscillates between its severe, potent tension and a sharp sense of dark humour. Anderson and DiCaprio have a lot of fun with Bob's frustration over his old colleagues trying to extract a long-forgotten code-word out of him before telling him where their safe haven is. Likewise the scenes involving Lockjaw's desperation to get into the Christmas Adventurers Club -his chosen white supremacist cult- and just his general obvious crippling insecurities. The dynamic between Bob and Benicio del Toro's Sensei, who comes to his rescue, is a joy to watch, and peppered throughout the movie are unique character quirks (particularly off of Bob) and clever notes of satire.
Melding earnest frantic desperation with comical drugged-out paranoia, DiCaprio delivers his most entertaining performance since Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, one that is physically demanding as well. Like in Killers of the Flower Moon he is happy to accept a leading role that is not the protagonist, stretching his capacity for eccentricity while still relating a very real and palpable pathos as an imperfect but intensely devoted father. His dedication to his cause comes across strongly, the most believably radical he has ever played. It is perhaps half as much as Teyana Taylor though, who is striking here in both her physical presence and in the moral complexities of her character. Perfidia is someone who could easily be slotted into one of a couple extremes of archetypes, a tough character to sympathize with for a significant stretch of her screen-time. Yet she communicates the rawness of her every feeling, the escalations of her impulses and mounting pressures of her unfocused desires. Even when holding all the cards, her vulnerability is clear through her stony expressions and it makes for a captivating performance -that in some places is nearly matched by the resilience of Willa. Chase Infiniti is a superb break-out here, likewise unflinching through trauma; an honest teenager (who lies about her cell phone) yet demonstrating a believable strength and resourcefulness beyond her years. She is the heart of the movie, avatar for so many a young person victimized by the state and Infiniti sells it tremendously.
But in a movie packed with magnificent performances, it is perhaps Penn who leaves the strongest impression, in what may well be a career-best from the gruff and contentious two-time Oscar winner. Lockjaw is as much a joke as he is a serious villain -a very smart choice by both Anderson and Penn, which accurately reflects the myriad of despicable clowns in real positions of American institutional power on which he is based. Penn brings the menace to his confrontation with Willa. At the same time he is comically insecure in his masculinity and sexuality -the way that he dresses and carries himself with such ill-fitting grandiosity is wonderfully ludicrous, his desperation to join his Nazi club just wonderfully pathetic. It is clear how much both Anderson and Penn loathe this man and all he represents and it results in a tremendous chemistry of an effect on the audience.
It is a necessary effect, especially now. Anderson has lucked into his movie being much more relevant now than when it was produced. The political divisions and insinuations he was addressing have been hyper-charged. And yet for the pointed scenes depicting border concentration camps, false flags facilitating violence towards protesters, and white supremacist men casually discussing retribution for an interracial relationship in the kind of chummy candor we saw in that leaked group chat from top Trump officials, it is all contextualized around the fundamental inhumanity of U.S. immigration policy towards minorities. Though not referred to as such, Lockjaw's contingent are clear stand-ins for ICE, hunting for immigrants to deport and abducting ideological undesirables to interrogate for information on Willa. These practices are framed as inherently evil by the film, resisting and taking a stand against them an inherent good by contrast -right up until the end with a rather blunt intonation on our collective duty to continue the fight and change the world, one battle after another.
There is a lot that goes down in this movie, especially in the latter acts, including a fascist tasked with taking out Lockjaw for not being racist enough, and an incredibly tense final chase sequence -which Anderson brings a hypnotic and turbulent flare to through astoundingly trippy camera effects. For all of its serious subjects, it is an exhilarating ride of a movie -that shouldn't be lost in any loftier political conversations. The hype for One Battle After Another is perhaps a touch overzealous -I wouldn't call it the best Hollywood movie of the decade or even Paul Thomas Anderson's masterpiece necessarily. Its reception comes as much from its environment as anything -an adult movie like this at this scale seemed genuinely unfeasible in the Hollywood of today. Yet I don't want to diminish its high qualities either. An excellent movie we will be talking about as long as there are like battles to be won.

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