There Will Be Blood = There Will Be ACTING!

We saw There Will Be Blood a long time ago (but not long enough!) and we've resisted posting about it to give the people out there with better things to do than see every movie the week it comes out a chance to amble over to the cineplex.

SPOILER ALERT!!! OK, so for the first hour, we were totally down. The film was visually overpowering and still rich with tiny details, and it also set scenes for a really interesting story to come. We liked the music just fine and where it all was going, and all the mystery, too, and we wanted to know what would happen next. It felt like no other movie, but it still felt self-assured and possessed with total direction.

TWBB really could have gone to any number of cinematic places-- some uncharted! -- from here, but guess where it went?! OMG you totally guessed right! When faced with a really strong set-up, and in need of secure prestige, dial *1 for ACTING. Then There Will be OSCARS.

For those of you who don't know Betty too well, this is not a compliment. The movie had some THEMES and some ACTING (the code is, when Daniel Day Lewis raises his voice, that means he feels real emotions) but no, you know, STORY. By the final scene, Daniel Day Lewis was phoning it in from Pluto, or maybe that other, really far away planet that just demoted and humiliated Pluto. He twisted his face up, he threw stuff around, we could just see P.T. Anderson (who we usually like) yelling "ACT!, Daniel, ACT!". So Daniel gives us Sir Laurence Pacino with a shotgun in a mansion. This movie is basically The Bucket List for the under-70 set. Hammy as pig farm, and it stinks.