When I first watched Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest feature One Battle After Another, it left me with a lot of thoughts. So many thoughts that I had to watch the film a second time to get a better grasp of it. Now having seen the film twice, here is what I can say. While, One Battler After Another isn’t PTA’s best film, it is definitely his most accessible and politically charged film to date that may finally win him that elusive Oscar.
We follow Bob Ferguson (Leonardo DiCaprio), a member of the far-left revolutionary group known as the French 75, who promises freedom for all through bombings of political offices, banks and power grids, bank robberies, and breaking out detention centers. However, after having a child with fellow member Perfidia Beverly Hills (Teyana Taylor), he is ready to hang up his revolutionary coat. But after a bank robbery goes wrong, Col. Steven J. Lockjaw (Sean Penn), begins rounding up the French 75, forcing Bob, his daughter Willa and the remaining members of the French 75 into hiding. Sixteen years later, the world hasn’t changed all that much. Bob is a washed up, paranoid drug addict who spends most of his days getting high and protecting his proud and self-sufficient daughter, Willa (Chase Infinity). However, when Lockjaw reappears, Bob and Willa become separated, throwing them into a battle to reunite.
The first act of One Battle After Another could honestly stand alone as its own film as it tracks the French 75 through their chaotic early years. It hums with reckless, youthful energy such as power trips, horniness, bad decisions, and a half-baked attempt at espionage. Though to be clear, their version of espionage is more about making noise than hitting real targets, the kind of noise that doesn’t really inspire people to join them. Especially given that the government is watching their every move, just waiting for them to slip. And when the French 75 finally do screw up, the fallout is swift as the whole organization crumbles in less than a fortnight, with the scattered survivors forced underground.
Act two shifts One Battle After Another into a whole new gear. PTA runs it like a stoner riff on The Odyssey, with Bob and Willa scrambling to escape the raids of Lockjaw, played by Sean Penn in a performance that’s equal parts pathetic and terrifying. Bob, embodied with both sincerity and hysterical stoner energy by Leonardo DiCaprio, becomes our way into this delirious world. Once word gets out that Lockjaw is after him again, Bob tumbles headfirst into his hazy, half-baked odyssey. He’s a mess. Always reacting, never pausing, incapable of putting together a plan, let alone remembering the codes of the revolutionary text. But his refusal to quit, his relentless stumbling forward to find his daughter, that’s the heartbeat of One Battle After Another.
At its core, One Battle After Another is really about a father and daughter finding their way back to each other. Reconciling, clashing, and ultimately realizing the strength that comes from protecting your community. Sure, the backdrop is thick with politics such as illegal immigration, white supremacy, revolutionary factions, and much more, but underneath all that noise, it’s still the story of how far a parent will go to protect their kid, and how that instinct ripples outward into collective survival. Perfidia, brought to life with raw force by Teyana Taylor, preaches about the dangers of power and the importance of community, even as she can’t resist getting swallowed by the very thing she warns against. Then there’s Sensei, played with effortless magnetism by Benicio del Toro, who hardly ever talks about community at all, but when it comes time to act, he doesn’t flinch, whether it’s for his people or a stranger. That contradiction, that quiet conviction, is the pulse of One Battle After Another.
Another undeniable strength of One Battle After Another is what PTA does behind the camera. Once the story kicks into gear, he launches us into something like a contemporary take of Mad Max: Fury Road, with our characters tearing through Baktan Cross in a relentless pursuit. The downtown sequences crackle with energy, and the car chases are so intense you can feel your knuckles locking on the armrest. On IMAX, it’s pure spectacle, grand, overwhelming, impossible to look away from. Layered with Jonny Greenwood’s piano score surging and swelling in the background, One Battle After Another enchants you.
In the end, One Battle After Another might not stand as PTA’s greatest achievement, but it’s easily his most accessible and his most important film to date, a film that manages to balance spectacle with substance without losing his signature bite. And if there’s any film in his career that could finally push him over the line with the Academy, it’s this one.
My Rating: A
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