There Will Be Blood

There will be Oscars for this magnificent tale of greed and obsession. A wordless opening 20 minutes in which Daniel Plainview (Day-Lewis) discovers oil at the dawn of the 20th century serves as a brilliantly economical character introduction - this is a man of unparalleled will and determination, who'll stop at nothing to get what he wants. The years fly by quickly after that, as Plainview inherits a son and grows rich after learning from a preacher (Dano) of abundant oil fields near his town, leading to the pair's decades long battle between commerce and faith. Day-Lewis plays his part in this struggle to quite astonishing effect, and for the first hour or more, There Will Be Blood is pretty much perfect cinema, a blend of storytelling and technical beauty the likes of which has rarely graced the screen. While it begins to falter at a certain point, as the narrative loses focus and the leaps forward in time grow larger, leaving huge gaps of untold story, it's a small price to experience such wonderful filmmaking. [Paul Greenwood]