There will be Blood

"Ladies and gentlemen, I am an oilman,'' are the first words uttered by protagonist Daniel Plainview in the new movie, There will be Blood, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson and starring Daniel Day-Lewis. It is a simple description, holding the rest of the movie prisoner as the events of the oilman's success begin to slowly (sometimes painfully) unfold.

The film is set in the late 1800's and tells the story of a poor miner that becomes filthy rich when he discovers oil. It is based on Upton Sinclair's 1927 book titled Oil!, a novel about the American gold industry and the underlying force that propelled it: greed. However in the movie's case, oil is the object and a fierce, rugged, hard man is its predator.

Although Daniel Day-Lewis gives a performance that hardly any other could ever deliver, the movie is suspiciously suspect for it anti-capitalist portrayal of man's lust for money and the greed that drives him to pursue it. Entertainment Weekly described the film as, "a story set in the fabled bad-old-days, [with] the terrors of modernity in its DNA." It is a "terror of modernity" that is brought about by a man's hard work, consquentially leading him to success? According to the movie, capitalism and the free market are the true enemy in today's world and those who enjoy their successes are its allies. But in this case, the proverb holds true for Hollywood: those is glass houses should not throw stones. Director, actor, or oilman the free market has given them their success. Who should be complaining?