{"id":18013,"date":"2025-10-14T20:00:28","date_gmt":"2025-10-15T00:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/?p=18013"},"modified":"2025-10-12T17:15:52","modified_gmt":"2025-10-12T21:15:52","slug":"one-battle-after-another-2025-paul-thomas-anderson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/archives\/18013","title":{"rendered":"One Battle After Another (2025, Paul Thomas Anderson)"},"content":{"rendered":"

John Semley in The Nation<\/a>:<\/p>\n

From Pynchon\u2019s 1990 novel Vineland<\/em>, Anderson borrows a basic conceit: A group of countercultural misfits, living underground, whose lives-on-the-fringe are disturbed by the return, years later, by a government tormentor operating as a stand-in for that all-American avatar of authority and oppression typically called \u201cThe Man.\u201d
\n…
\nAt first blush, Vineland<\/em> seemed unadaptable in a contemporary context. Not only because of the density of the prose or the lunacy of its plot\u2014which includes a Godzilla attack, a UFO, and a tow truck that ferries the spirits of the damned to hell\u2014but because of its chronology … But Anderson\u2019s film proves that these more central divisions \u2014 between freaks and squares, parents and children, the rigid brokers of authority and subversive agents of liberation \u2014 can be mapped across American history.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Josh Lewis<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Perhaps what I liked most about this After Hours<\/a><\/em>-esque odyssey of Leo being a bozo father trying his best though, is that he ultimately contributes next to nothing in terms of physical help to Willa who is experiencing her own completely separate bravura setpiece, that builds itself out so patiently from so many gradually accumulated details you honestly don\u2019t realize you\u2019re in PTA\u2019s version of a T2\/Friedkin car chase until it\u2019s already under way.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Israel Daramola in Defector<\/a>:<\/p>\n

I’m reminded of another great character in the film: Deandra (Regina Hall), who generates so much sadness and empathy with how she looks at and regards other characters, especially Willa, and how Anderson photographs those feelings that can’t be grasped with words on her face and then frames it in a scene. There’s so much love and care all over this movie full of anguish, explosions, and weed jokes.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Also Good: Paul Duane<\/a><\/p>\n

Reminder to revisit Robert Daniels’s Time piece<\/a> after seeing The Mastermind<\/em> and Eddington<\/em>.<\/p>\n

And of course Nayman<\/a>, whose Coens book I just finished and whose Anderson book is on deck.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

John Semley in The Nation: From Pynchon\u2019s 1990 novel Vineland, Anderson borrows a basic conceit: A group of countercultural misfits, living underground, whose lives-on-the-fringe are disturbed by the return, years later, by a government tormentor operating as a stand-in for that all-American avatar of authority and oppression typically called \u201cThe Man.\u201d … At first blush, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2643,1671,248,116,2527,306,620],"class_list":["post-18013","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie","tag-2020s","tag-leonardo-dicaprio","tag-nazis","tag-pt-anderson","tag-regina-hall","tag-revolution","tag-sean-penn"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18013","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18013"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18013\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18036,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18013\/revisions\/18036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}