"There Will Be Blood" Movie Synopsis
Somewhere in the New Mexico desert, in 1898, a prospector named Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis) mines for silver. While trying to blast out the small mine with dynamite, he accidentally falls into the mine and breaks his leg. Lying at the bottom of the hole, he collects samples of the silver ore, and drags himself into the nearest town to record his claim. Some time afterwards, he and a hired crew continuing mining for silver and discover oil in the mine. One of his crewman dies in a drilling accident on site and Daniel adopts the man’s orphaned son, naming him H.W. Nine years later, Daniel, with H.W. as his business “partner”, has a successful yet minor oil business on the rise and they travel throughout the West to buy drilling rights to private property. At a meeting with several residents of an unidentified town, Daniel portrays himself as “family man” to the potential investors and lectures them about his business. The locals begin to question him vigorously and argue loudly amongst themselves. Daniel turns down the offer to drill there, stating “I wouldn’t take the lease if i was given to me as a gift.” He leaves knowing the townsfolk would be too smart to be taken advantage of.
One night, Daniel is approached by a young man named Paul Sunday (Paul Dano) who tells Daniel about an oil deposit under his family’s ranch in Little Boston, California. Daniel and H.W. pack up and head to the Sunday Ranch pretending to hunt quail but to really confirm what Paul told them. That night, Daniel negotiates with Abel Sunday, Paul’s father, and Eli Sunday, Paul’s “twin brother” and an ambitious preacher. (There’s a theory that Eli actually has split personality and Paul is one of his personas since Paul isn’t ever seen again after his meeting with Daniel). Daniel offers $3,700 for their property but Eli demands $10,000. Daniel offers to pay half of the money first and then the rest once business is thriving.
Daniel builds the first oil rig on the Sunday Ranch and begins to buy off almost the entire land surrounding the ranch, so that he may build a pipeline in the near future to cut shipping costs. Only one man refuses to sell Daniel his property: William Bandy. Eli tells Daniel that he wishes to bless the tower on the day drilling begins, to which Daniel reluctantly agrees but then rebuffs his request at the ceremony. Eli’s little sister, Mary and H.W. become friends although Eli and Daniel oppose one another. Daniel becomes more irritated by Eli and vice versa. Daniel resents Eli’s religious overbearing. Suddenly, a worker dies in an accident while drilling. When Daniel goes to Eli’s dilapidated church to make funeral arrangements, he witnesses Eli delivering a disturbing sermon which involved him “casting out the Devil” of an elderly woman with arthritis. After the sermon, Eli scorns Daniel, saying that had he blessed the drill, no accidents would have happened.
Sometime later, the drill finally strikes oil, but the escaping gases causes a huge explosion, which takes away H.W.’s hearing permanently. A huge fire erupts and continues endlessly as more and more oil bursts from the ground, forcing Daniel and his crew to tear down the tower. Despite his son’s condition, Daniel is overjoyed at the amount of oil he has discovered beneath the ground. Daniel soon builds three more oil wells in the Little Boston area. Eli confronts Daniel demanding the other $5000 promised to him to which Daniel slaps him across the face and beats him mercilessly. He mocks his “faith healing abilities” saying if he was truly a "vessel of the Holy Spirit", why can’t he restore his son’s hearing. He drags Eli to a puddle of mud and smears it all over Eli saying “I’m going to bury you into the ground.”
Shortly later, a man named Henry appears to Daniel claiming to be his brother, telling him that their father has died and he has come looking for work. Henry appears to know a lot about Daniel’s family and hometown so Daniel decides to trust him and hires him as a worker. Daniel begins to confide in Henry, telling him things he has never told anyone. He tells him how he possesses a lot of competition in him, and says “I want no one else to succeed.” H.W., suspicious and jealous of Henry, attempts to burn the house down while he and Daniel are asleep in their beds. Afterwards, Daniel and H.W. are on a train, and Daniel tells H.W. (despite his not being able to understand him) that he wants to have a word with the conductor, but instead, he gets off the train and abandons H.W.
Daniel and Henry meet with a couple of competitors who give Daniel an offer to buy off his wells, but after numerous references they make to H.W. and how Daniel should spend more time with him, Daniel becomes infuriated and threatens to cut his throat. Afterwards, Daniel makes a deal with Union Oil. Together, he and Henry set up markers along a distance of 100 miles for the pipeline. Daniel begins to reminisce about their childhood to Henry, but Henry fails to understand a specific reference Daniel has made, making Daniel grow suspicious. That night, Daniel confronts Henry, holding a pistol to his head. Henry admits that he isn’t actually Daniel’s brother, but he knew him in Kansas before he died of tuberculosis. Then Henry assumed his identity, read his diary and made his way to Daniel. Daniel then shoots Henry and buries him in a shallow and wet grave. He reads his brother’s diary that Henry had with him and begins to sob uncontrollably.
The next morning, Daniel wakes to find William Bandy, the man whose property Daniel still has yet to lease, sitting next to him. William Bandy promises to sell his land to him on the condition that he attends the Church of the Third Revelation to cleanse his soul of sin and become baptized. When Daniel asks what sins he has committed, William Bandy hands him over the pistol that Daniel used to shoot Henry. Realizing that William knows he killed Henry, he reluctantly agrees to the condition.
Daniel and William attend the church where Eli performs his sermon. Daniel gets up to the altar where Eli provokes him to admit his sins, one including abandoning H.W. Daniel becomes emotional and repeats over and over “I have abandoned my child! I have my abandoned my child!” Daniel is baptized and afterwards warmly embraced by church members.
Some time thereafter, H.W. returns and Daniel embraces him intensely, to which H.W. slaps him across the face. H.W. knows sign language now, and is attended by an interpreter so that others may understand him. Mary begins to learn sign language as well to communicate better with H.W.
In 1927, a grown Mary and H.W. become married, while Daniel has become a raging misanthropic alcoholic living in more isolation than ever. He resides in a massive mansion, with one butler tending to him, and spends most of his time shooting his valuables with a pistol or lying on the floor in a drunken stupor. Daniel gets a visit from H.W. who tells his father that he and Mary are moving to Mexico where he’ll begin his own drilling company. Daniel becomes enraged at the realization that his son is going to become his competitor, and through his rage, informs H.W. that he is not truly his son but an “orphan from a basket in the middle of the desert.” He goes on to say “You have none of me in you, you’re someone else’s.” H.W. gets up and through his interpreter remarks “Thank God I have none of you in me.” and leaves Daniel.
A little while later, Daniel gets a visit from Eli while he lies drunk in his mansion’s bowling alley. While Daniel gnaws at his dinner his butler left for him during his stupor, Eli explains to him that William Bandy has died and his grandson wants to sell the oil drilling rights to his grandfather’s land in order to fund his goal of becoming an actor. Eli is the broker for the deal. Daniel agrees to the deal on the condition that Eli says that he is a “false prophet and God is a superstition.” Eli reluctantly does so several times, and then Daniel reveals to him that because of the wells Daniel built around the Bandy’s ranch, he has already taken the oil from the Bandy property through drainage. Eli reveals his financial turmoil, due to bad investments and begs Daniel to do something however, Daniel enjoys the torment that Eli is suffering and begins to traumatize him even more with remarks regarding his “brother” Paul as the smart one while Eli is just an “afterbirth that crawled out of his mother’s filth.” He taunts Eli even more with remarks about drinking up everything of Eli’s. Daniel throws Eli down on the floor and begins throwing bowling balls in his direction to which Eli clumsily avoids. Daniel begins to chase him around the bowling alley while yelling “I am the Third Revelation!” Daniel then bludgeons Eli to death with a bowling pin and sits next to his dead and bloody body on the floor. Daniel’s butler enters the room calling for Daniel to which Daniel turns around and replies “I’m finished!”
Three Significant Scenes
Scene 1) Theme of Film: Lust, Greed, Control
"There's a whole ocean of oil under our feet! No one can get to it except for me!"
I felt that this scene was the most relevant in the sense of the overall theme of the entire film: Daniel's lust for control and his greed for a prosperous oil business. Daniel's willingness to take advantage of people and subject them to lies in order to pursue his drilling business plays a large role in the losses of all of his personal relationships as well as the misanthropic and secluded lifestyle he acquires later on in the film. In this scene, Daniel realizes just how prosperous Little Boston is for his business and his greed from then on becomes as intense as ever. He aims to conquer all of the land, doing whatever he must to ensure no obstacles are in his way. Eli and his religious pursuit and H.W.'s loss of hearing are a couple examples of the obstacles Daniel deals with in the film.
Interpretive Representation
In order to interpret Daniel's greed for the land of Little Boston in order to pursue a prosperous drilling business, I felt that casting a shadow over an area of open land would successfully emulate a sense of "foreshadowing dominance".
Scene 2) Plot Relevance: Eli versus Daniel / Religion versus Business
"Where's my money Daniel?"
In this scene, Eli is about to approach Daniel and a couple members of his crew to demand the $5000 owed to him, right before Daniel beats him down and mocks his "spiritual healing" ability. This specific still from the scene, I felt, really represented the struggle for power between Daniel and Eli, where Daniel seeks control over Little Boston through means of business, promising the people a bright future of economical success and Eli seeks to maintain control over his hometown through religious means as the town's pastor. In this still, we see Eli overlooking the wide field and pond of oil that is pouring out of a pipeline, out to the group of men. To me, this scene provides a sense of hostility and tension between Eli and Daniel as the two men both seek control, yet through different measures.
Interpretive Representation
In order to interpret the tension and fight for power that occurred between Daniel and Eli in the film, I felt that a panorama was the successful approach. The film is entirely filmed in a widescreen format to communicate the vastness of the Western US desert setting and I felt it was necessary to portray this vastness in a similar way. On the opposite ends of the panorama, two figures stand (one portraying Daniel and one portraying Eli) facing each other across the wide open field in which I attempted to emulate the fight for control over the land of Little Boston. I had the figures contrast each other by having one dressed in white and the other dressed in black in order to represent the religious pursuit of power versus the business pursuit of power.
Scene 3) Camera Angle: Mid-Angle, Wide Distance Shot
"I'm finished!"
This is the most notorious scene of "There Will Be Blood": Eli's death scene. In this scene, Daniel is approached by Eli for a business deal to which Daniel knows there is no potential, however, Eli doesn't realize this and Daniel provokes Eli to renounce God as Eli had provoked Daniel to renounce his familial values. Just as family was a crutch for Daniel that aided him in his pursuit for a prosperous oil business, God is Eli's crutch. The man that has beaten Daniel down and denounced him in front of several people at his baptism, approaches him asking for help and this is Daniel's one chance to settle the score with Eli. And once he has Eli vulnerable and beaten, Daniel kills him in order to ensure that he will never overpower Daniel again. Although this scene is key and I would say, the ultimate climax to the film entirely (and I would definitely say there is more than one climax), however the focus of the scene is the camera angle. Just like all other key scenes, this one is shot in a mid-angle wide shot with a heavy sense of perspective. However, I feel that this specific camera angle also provides as a strong supporting factor of the overall atmosphere of the scene and the plot of the film ultimately.
Interpretive Representation
To me, the last scene of the movie provided as a sort of ending note to Daniel's pursuit for control and showed us Daniel overcoming his very last obstacle in order to become invincible. This last scene showed us Daniel's final choice he makes (as the film is spent developing on Daniel's choices) and his last interaction with someone who stood in his way in his pursuit for power. For the interpretive representation, I emulated the mid-angle and wide distance shot that is similar to the final scene of the movie, as well I wanted to provide a visual representation of Daniel's final words "I'm finished!" To me, this line meant that he has beaten the last of his opponents, and with H.W. about to begin his own drilling company, Daniel has no heir to his own. He is doomed to die alone and secluded, along with his business. In this interpretive image, I provided a representation of Daniel's inevitable demise through the gate that is seen at the end of the path. This gate represents the barrier to which Daniel's life will no longer be able to progress further. I was also really pleased with the way the lighting in this photograph occurred. As I took this shot, the clouds casted a shadow over the gate and I thought that this really interpreted the darkness and seclusion that Daniel's choices had led his life into.
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