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The Paramount film "There Will Be Blood" starred the Daniel Day Lewis playing a ruthless, criminally ambitious oil prospector in turn-of-the century California. The character is Daniel Plainview. The film has as a major child character, PLainview's adopted son, H.B. Ailman (played by Dillon Freasier), whom Painview
brings up as his own boy in order to project the image of a family man and thus decieve and exploit those whose oil-rich land he seeks to acquire for business purposes. As the story proceeds, Plainview becomes more and fanatically single-minded in his desire to crush all opposition and to get the better of everyone, including a hypocritical evangelist, Eli Sunday (played by Paul Dano), who has his own ambitions and who poses as a devout fundamentalist Christian in order to further his own material schemes. At one point the boy, H.B. is made deaf by an explosion when an oil derick explodes and catches fire after which Plainview, his foster father, loses interest in the boy and at one point actually abandons him. The film was directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, made in 2007 and released in 2008. Daniel Day Lewis received the Academy Award for his portrayal of Plainview.
"There Will Be Blood" was directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, made in 2007 and released in 2008. Daniel Day Lewis received the Academy Award for his portrayal of ruthless oilman Daniel Plainview. We have to ask the question as to whether the Academy awarded the award because of brilliant or if the condemntion of an oil driller was not a factor. (Any one conected with Oil and coal production are today favored targets of populist politicans and the left wing media.) A reader writes, "this is a very grim (but spectacular) film. I think the antihero of the piece is based upon an actual historical person--but rather loosely so." The person that the main character is based on is oilman Edward L. Doheny. As far as we can tell, not content to sckewer justv an oilman, Hollywood has added a fundamentalist preacher that had nothing to do with Dohreny, but is a favorote left-wing target.
The real Daniel Plainview was Edward L. Doheny of Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. He has been referred p as the "The King of California oil". As a result he acquired phenomenal wealth. He was also played a major role in the infamous Teapot Dome Scandal that played a major role in descrediting the Harding administration. Like many of the American industrial robber barrons, he made major philinthropic donations to Los Angeles institutions. (This is not mentioned in the film.) This was not the first time that Doheny was depicted. He was the real life person that was the basis for for Upton Sinclair's 1927 expose Oil, Sinclair is even better known for an exarlier expose--The Jungle in which he depicted sanitary conditions and exploitation of immigrant labor by the Chicago meat packing industry. Scenes in There Will Be Blood werecactually shot in Doheny'imposing 55 room Beverly Hills mansion--Greystone. The boy in the film is entirely fictional. Doheny adult son, however did die tragically under misterious circumstances. Doheny built Greystone for Ned and his family (five children). Ned anf his male sectretary died 4 mounts after moving into Geystone (February 1929)O. It is not clear if it was murder or suiside.
Both Ned and his secreatry, Hugh Plunket, were onvolved in Doheny's trial as part of the Tea Pot Dome Scandal. The investigation of the candal was led by Wisconsin's crusading senator, Robert M. La Follette.
The Paramount film "There Will Be Blood" starred the Daniel Day Lewis playing a ruthless, criminally ambitious oil prospector in turn-of-the century California. The character is Daniel Plainview. The film has as a major child character, PLainview's adopted son, H.B. Ailman (played by Dillon Freasier).
The film is set in the California oil fields. I'm not sure just where in Californisa this was.
Much of the action is set in about 1911-12.
Painview brings up as his own boy in order to project the image of a family man and thus decieve and exploit those whose oil-rich land he seeks to acquire for business purposes. As the story proceeds, Plainview becomes more and fanatically single-minded in his desire to crush all opposition and to get the better of everyone, including a hypocritical evangelist, Eli Sunday (played by Paul Dano), who has his own ambitions and who poses as a devout fundamentalist Christian in order to further his own material schemes. At one point the boy, H.B. is made deaf by an explosion when an oil derick explodes and catches fire after which Plainview, his foster father, loses interest in the boy and at one point actually abandons him.
The costume designer tries to reflect the period acurately. H. B. wears a double-breasted knickers suit in some
scenes with a conventional collar and tie, black long stockings, and hightop shoes. We see him also in several informal scenes when he is dressed only in his underwear, a grey woolen union suit with short
sleeves and thigh-length legs. A still shows Plainview holding his son in his underwear after
the accident at the oil derick. Anoher still shows H.B. dressed up for travel in his knickers suit with shirt and tie.
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The extras of the DVD contain some historical footage and some stills, including an interesting photo of two children, one of whom may be a boy on whom the character of H.B. is based. He is wearing what look
like knee trousers and long black stockings. The photo is historical, showing a boy about H.B.'s age (about 11 or 12) wearing a knee pants suit with black long stockings. This apparently influence H.B.'s costume.
I remember as an idealistic young liberal in school learning about the evuls of stereotyping. It is interesting to watch Hollywood today. While racial sterotyping has disappeared from films, Hollywood has replaced them with a new set of sterotypes. A favorites is Christian--especilly fundamentalist Christians. Notice that hypocrits when depicted in films are often Christians. And here we have an excellent example.
And of course the main character and arch villan is an oil driller. In is fascinating that in an enviroment of rising oil prices in part because of declining domestic oil production that the Academy Award would go a film about an evil oil driller. We will never see a film about an evil enviromentalist who helps lower domestic oil production (thus increasing oil prices) and an associated hyporitical individual poseing as a seculat athiest populist. The works of great authors are marked by nuance in individual characters. We see this in Shakespeare and the great authors who followed him. This appears to be a principle that Hollywood has abandoned to outright propaganda. Some of the plots comeing out of Hollywood would not be too different than Soviet movie making.
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