One Battle After Another movie review

 

I saw the trailer, the posters, and the wildly positive reviews from nearly all the most known movie critics. Long and short of it, I wanted to anyways, but seeing the critical reception I thought best to go to the cinema and see the latest Paul Thomas Anderson movie One Battle After Another, featuring Leonardo DiCaprio, as soon as possible, before I heard too much about the movie. 

The trailer was confusing to me. It seemed like some kind of gonzo revolution story with a lost and haggard looking man, Leonardo Di Caprio as the main protagonist, possibly fighting The Man, capital M. Difficult to get much else than that general vibe, though it certainly sounded intriguing to me. 

I don't particularly enjoy spoilers so this review won't contain any, I won't even go into much more of the actual storyline or events unfolding. I am pretty much as enthusiastic as most of the positive critics reviews, and recommend you watch it and make up your own mind. It's probably the best movie I've seen at the cinema this year. The one I saw before was Ari Aster's Eddington that I didn't write or post about, and funny enough while different I feel there are similarities. They both take place in mostly remote places in the United States southwest near the Mexican border, for example. There's more, but some of the landscapes are similar, at the very least. The photography is gorgeous.

One Battle After Another's vibe feels both gonzo and alternate enough that one wonders if this is meant to be a slightly different parallel universe, or a slightly secret or fictional layer to our own. Themes are similar enough to our world that I'm tempted to go with the second option, though they're arguably similar enough to maybe not matter. One way or another it mirrors struggles related to inequalities and the concentration of power and money. The movie is also frantic, with enough slow and tense scenes for the faster paced ones to shine.

Both famous and lesser known actors are fantastic. Teyana Taylor, Sean Penn, and Benicio Del Toro play characters I feel are very anchored in their own factions and worldviews, while Leonardo DiCaprio's Bob quickly feels like a pinball being shot from one side of the board to the other with little agency of his own.

I loved it, but some might think it is a little long, an affliction of many movies these days. And the gonzo level might not be to everyone's liking. I enjoyed the chaotic ride, but without going into much detail, some might think it is a bit lacking in consistency. There is a little bit of "what did I just watch?" feeling at the end, though arguably less than for Eddington – for me at least.