Wait...at the end of 'Once Upon a Time in America', I remember Elizabeth McGovern inexplicably looks like she's still 25 or so (which might have been intentional, because it's kind of brilliant in a weird way)...and I will hand it to 'A League of Their Own' for only this reason: the casting of the future-leap old women was freakishly, creepily well done. Do NOT ask me why I remember this.

Yes, the final scene turns the film into a comedy, But my theory is that PTA's telling us that we were supposed to have been laughing all along. And there are earlier scenes that back this up. But (to keep yesterday's metaphor going strong) I don't want to blow my wad before I publish my review, so let's just say for the time being that you're right, but I totally disagree that it's a bad thing. But several critics are with you. I thought this David Carr post was particularly infuriating:

http://carpetbagger.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12/11/no-end-no-matter/

it's weird, when i read things like that David Carr guy or that Hollywood Elsewhere dude, i feel like i disagree with the way they present their beef, but it's impossible to deny that we shared an initially similar reaction. i dunno. i'd just rather not be lumped in with them, if at all possible. they both kind of annoy me.

Could you be vaguer regarding There Will Be Blood? It ain't playing peroria yet and I'm going to see it for Jewish Christmas.

I completely disagree with you, Mike. I would STRONGLY argue that Lewis doesn't waver in tone at any point in that film. He's the same Daniel Plainview in the last scenes as he was in the previous, he's just put in situations where the extreme side of his personality rises to the surface. Is his performance in the last reel any different than his last scene with Kevin J. O'Connor? No.

I just don't think that actor has the ability to do anything other than be consistent and focused in a complete way. (To digress here, I will absolutely defend his choices in GANGS OF NEW YORK- agreed, a terrible movie, but he not only is the best part of a bad movie, he's good enough to make that movie relevant enough to recommend.) He is so intense that people's Q&A questions seemed completely off-base: "How'd you prepare for the role?" I have a feeling that dude just reads it, and nods and decides to be the guy he read.

I actually really like the last scene of this film. When he booms the word "DRAINAGE!" like a sermon, I don't think Lewis could've made any better choice. I was in it- didn't see it as comedic at all. Dano is in there acting his heart out as well. I think it's the perfect logical extension of that man, and a satisfying conclusion to what we'd seen to that point.

Maybe you were just into the older period costumes and grumpy once everyone stopped wearing jackboots? While I can nod in agreement that while NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN is a fantastic film, there's something that seems less-than-prefect about it that I can't quite define. This film does not do that. It is the real deal: a movie that will stand for a very long time. THERE WILL BE BLOOD made me feel like when I watched CHILDREN OF MEN. Like, "Oh, shit. People are gonna dismiss this movie and debate it's greatness, but it'll be standing in 20 years as a hallmark. Then all those people who dismissed it will talk lovingly about it like they felt that way all along."

I really think you should watch it again. I think that you are wrong.

CHILDREN OF MEN is the most overrated movie of the past decade.

I'm with Craig on this one Mike...I think you've misinterpreted the final segment.

You refer to it as "straight up comedy" -- I don't think that's correct.

I've seen the film twice now. At the first screening there was very little laughter. The second, quite a few people were chuckling. Might it have been the audience's reaction last night that influenced your take on it?

[Mild spoilers follow.]

Plainview is relishing the encounter with Eli. It's his comeuppance for the baptism scene, and drawing it out is part of the pleasure. Sure, there's a dark humor to the scene, but not by any means can you say the scene was written as "straight up comedy."

to anyone who hasn't seen this movie: don't read this post or these comments--sorry!

i don't know how to clearly express my thoughts. maybe Mr. Bronstein can help me out, because we had an identical reaction. and i did say that i know my opinion is going to change about this but i thought it was important that i get it down. i dunno, though. for me the first showdown with Eli had an utterly different tone than the last one, and while the stakes and situations had changed, i just had this deeper feeling that the thing had derailed. i feel the same way about the steak scene and that confrontation.

this is all subjective. i'm not saying i'm right. it's just that i was so incredibly connected to what was happening that my honest reaction is that they betrayed what had happened in the first two hours.

and you're right, Craig. i can't say for sure but i also have a strong hunch that it was the leap forward into "modern times" that jarred me out of my comfort zone. as i said, i've always had a problem with this happening in movies. it's perhaps a strong belief of mine that movies should follow relatively more condensed periods of time. i still want examples of when this concept was terrifically, majestically executed!

writing this now, i wish i could go to a screening of it again tonight. so that's saying something. i'm convinced it will be even better the second go 'round. so that's saying something else.

instead, tonight i will go to Anthology for THE HOLY MODAL ROUNDERS... BOUND TO LOSE followed by the Muscular Christians performance at Parkside at 10pm. that's where everyone needs to be too!

that influenced your take on it?"

ONE HUNDRED FRIGGIN' PERCENT.

i almost wish i had been in that theater by myself.

Certainly an argument against the collective experience of filmgoing.

which is strange because i normally LOVE seeing movies with crowds. that said, my initial reaction to PUNCH-DRUNK LOVE was completely opposite of the audience (they were laughing at everything, i was breathless and nearly moved to tears) and they didn't get in my way there. who knows. the point is that this movie is INCREDIBLE.

oh, how about BARRY LYNDON as a film that spans time and doesn't bother me? then again, it took me a few viewings to really appreciate that one, and i think we can all agree that the same goes for BLOOD.

actually, you can go to a screening of it tonight. this is, for whatever reason, not sold out:
http://www.92y.org/shop/event_detail.asp?productid=T%2DLC5FL04

i heard that's wrong, actually, and that there aren't any seats available. either way, i can't swing tonight. gotta support my peoples...

I always thought that Carnal Knowledge did a nice job of spanning a large chunk of time. Though, that film is episodic, and that might help.

Sivertson wanted to make a DePalma homage and his model was FEMME FATALE - the loopiest of all DePalma thrillers... completely intentional. From the horses mouth.

OF COURSE it was unintentional! but lindsey can do whatever she wants as far as i'm concerned. THAT's who i wanna hang out with.

I've had mixed feelings about the end of TWBB as well. The time jump jarred me a little, and I was uncertain exactly what to make of it (weighty conclusion or un-necessary melodrama) when Iwalked out of the theater, but the more I've lived with it, the more I think it was the way to go.

In terms of humor, I agree that the scene very much plays off the baptism scene, which was more straight comedy than the finale, as far as I'm concered, so 1927 wasn't introducing a new tone of dark humor.

(SPOILER ALERT - although I have a feeling anyone who reads the comments on Tully's blog is a big enough film dork to have seen the movie twice by now)

I do love the fact that a moive starts with a guy alone in the dessert digging a hole like an animal, and ends up with him reaching the pinnacle of monied society but acting even more savage - with a bowling pin, nonetheless.

Also, the final scene with the son cannot be ignored as part of the 1927 sequence. This to me was the perfect culmination of the story line.

In some ways I think 1927 was the core of the movie, and everything else was a long, ruthless build-up. As if the film was trying to dissect how a whacked out, complex industrialist became both civilized, brutal, wealthy, rational, charming and insane, so the story had to go back to the moment of creation. To fully realize the moral outcome of this character, I think it was necessary to follow him till he had it all, and see what toll that ultimately took on him.

i really like what you said, Jesse, and, as you also also said, it perhaps took you a little bit of time to fully grasp that understanding. i'm just being honest. that shit was a shock to my system, plain and simple, and it was really tough to swallow. i kinda wanted to see a movie that made me think and feel what you're saying while i was watching it, even if i couldn't express it right then and there. there's no greater respect one can pay to a film than having it evolve for you upon subsequent viewings and grow into something much deeper, but, man, my immediate in-the-moment reaction to that thing was, 'come back, where are you going, pleassse come back!'

I felt the same way - I was blown away by 2/3's of TWBB. The first half hour was some of the best filmmaking I've seen in a theater in quite some time (I enjoyed No Country as well). But by the end I felt PTA had become self indulgent and felt that the storytelling lacked in many areas. I especially had felt that the oil fire was bumpy - i could fill in the characters' thought process, but it felt as though a moment was missing. This was confirmed after reading this month's ASC magazine where it was noted that the scene was incomplete. Daniel-Day Lewis is beyond phenomonal in this film - I just wonder whether it would hold up without him.

Again, it's a film I really respect and loved for 2/3's, maybe more, but where No County's ending felt fitting to me, here I felt there was a self-conciousness to the last five minutes of the film that took me out of the moment (not to mention that the butler was an unusually weak performance in a film of unusually strong ones). Of course I also feel like I'm defective because I seem to be missing the point. Still, 2007 was a great year for film loves and I think 2008 will continue the trend. I'm looking forward to Paranoid Park and a few others.