"In the course of his three-decade career, the director Paul Thomas Anderson has dramatized the nineteen-seventies porn industry ("Boogie Nights"), the Californian oil boom ("There Will Be Blood"), and a mid-century London fashion house ("Phantom Thread"). Now he's trained his gaze on present-day America."
"On this episode of Critics at Large, Vinson Cunningham, Naomi Fry, and Alexandra Schwartz discuss Anderson's latest: the sprawling, surprisingly political blockbuster "One Battle After Another." They contextualize the new work within his œuvre-and debate what his portrayal of militant left-wing activists and right-wing white supremacists has to say about the state of the nation. "I think our present reality has far outstripped most depictions of it," Schwartz says. "Slipping it into this kind of caper-is that delivering us to somewhere that gets people to think or to look or to feel?""
Paul Thomas Anderson has dramatized the 1970s porn industry, the Californian oil boom, and a mid-century London fashion house. He now centers his filmmaking on present-day America with One Battle After Another. The film is sprawling and surprisingly political, portraying militant left-wing activists alongside right-wing white supremacists. The portrayal interrogates contemporary polarization and raises questions about what such representations say about the state of the nation. The film’s caper framing prompts consideration of whether stylized, genre-inflected approaches can make audiences think, look, or feel differently about urgent political realities. The work connects thematically to Anderson’s earlier films.
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