Shocking New Twist to ‘There Will Be Blood’! Unmissable Top Movies This Week in LA!

Hi there! I’m Mark Olsen. I’m thrilled to guide you through another dive into a universe filled with Nothing But Great Films.

Among the films hitting the screens this week is Payal Kapadia’s “All We Imagine as Light.” The movie garnered significant attention when it bagged the runner-up Grand Prix award at its Cannes Film Festival premiere earlier this year. It stirred quite a buzz when it was not chosen as India’s submission for the Academy Award for international feature.

The film explores the friendship of three women living in Mumbai. In a recent conversation with Glenn Whipp, Kapadia discussed her film’s depiction of the city: “Mumbai is a perilous city — its geography is in constant change. Historically, it was a cluster of seven islands that was connected by the British East India Company to establish it as a port after they lost their port in Surat. The city’s origin is rooted in a super-capitalistic, colonialist past. The city continues to evolve. Developers are taking over areas where people have resided for years. Women move there seeking liberation, but there is a sense of temporaryness as well.”

In his review for The Times, Joshua Rothkopf described the film as “a masterfully subtle piece of art,” appreciating Kapadia’s range and mastery over various emotional tones. “Denying a reader the experience of watching Kapadia peel away layers of her film, reinventing it in an entirely new tone would be a disservice. It’s as if the director herself is faced with a profound choice: to depict women in the depth of their complexities, feeling frustrated and deserted? Or to offer them an escape? Aptly, for a filmmaker who already seems significant, her response is straightforward. We require both.”

‘There Will Be Blood’ in 35mm

On Sunday, the Academy Museum’s David Geffen Theater will screen Paul Thomas Anderson’s 2007 film, “There Will Be Blood,” featuring Daniel Day-Lewis, in 35mm. These words alone might have some people rushing to buy tickets, as the chance to fully experience the film’s magnitude should draw the PTA loyalists in great numbers. Others should take note as well.

The screening is part of a series that includes films such as Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon,” John Ford’s “Stagecoach,” Delmer Daves’ “Broken Arrow,” Gore Verbinski’s “The Lone Ranger” and Sam Peckinpah’s “The Wild Bunch,” among others. This series, curated by Adam Piron, redefines the concept of the western.

In an email, Piron, director of Sundance Institute’s Indigenous Program, elaborated on his curatorial concept after being approached by the Academy Museum’s director of film programs K.J. Relth-Miller. “An idea I’ve been keen to investigate is looking at the western from the perspective of what I believe has always been the genre’s main character, which I would say is the landscape,” Piron wrote. “You see its arc in some form in every film that falls under the western category.”

Piron further stated, “Thematically, I aimed to provide a multi-decade perspective on westerns that have been Oscar nominees and view them through recurring themes in the genre, specifically Indigenous peoples’ rightful claim to their homelands, the philosophical debate the genre initiates on the interpretation of laws on this land, and the human and environmental catastrophes that stem from exploiting the landscape itself.

“I hope that the Academy Museum’s audiences can watch these films with a revitalized appreciation for their artistic depths and how they can adopt new interpretations as our culture continues to evolve, and to some extent see how Native American audiences might view the western from their perspective as it relates to understanding the land itself as its own entity.”

“There Will Be Blood” is an adaptation of Upton Sinclair’s 1927 novel “Oil!” Daniel Day-Lewis stars as the ruthlessly ambitious Daniel Plainview, who amasses his wealth as an oil tycoon in the early 20th century.

In his original review of the film, Kenneth Turan wrote that the collaboration between Anderson and Day-Lewis “might be the most explosive combination since the Molotov cocktail. Although it can be excessive and over the top, this morality play set in the early days of California’s oil boom also generates considerable heat and light and inflicts some serious aesthetic damage.”

Turan added, “Although he initially seems almost likable, as Plainview accumulates grudges and animosities over the years, his coldness and arrogance become more apparent and his disregard for and contempt for humanity grow exponentially. This, ‘There Will Be Blood’ is partly saying, is what happens to us when, as either business or religious leaders, we reject our humanity and overemphasize wealth and power.”

‘The Misfits’

On Saturday night, Vidiots will host a screening of Gia Coppola’s new film “The Last Showgirl” with Coppola and the film’s star Pamela Anderson present for a Q&A. Anderson will also introduce a screening of John Huston’s 1961 film “The Misfits.”

Anderson chose the film herself, and it is a fascinating accompaniment to “The Last Showgirl.” If Coppola and Anderson’s film is a subtle reflection on the conclusion of something left unsaid, then so is “The Misfits.” The last film completed by Marilyn Monroe, the film was also the last for co-star Clark Gable, who passed away before its release. The film’s script was written by Arthur Miller, who was married to Monroe during the production, but they soon divorced.

Both on and off the screen, “The Misfits” is about a woman in transition, in search of herself. Anderson’s decision to present and introduce it is all the more impressive, highlighting the resonances in “The Last Showgirl” and parallels to her own career.

Writing about the film for The Times in February 1961, Philip K. Scheuer stated, “Only time will give ‘The Misfits’ a proper evaluation; it is one of the most unique films ever made, and the circumstances under which it was made were equally unique. Today’s spectator can hardly watch it without being aware of the real-life (and death) implications that accompanied its creation, as the screenplay is a first by playwright Arthur Miller, its female lead is Marilyn Monroe, the woman who was his wife during its gestation period, and the male lead is Clark Gable, whose death this strenuous role may or may not have expedited. In a sense, there may be too much audience participation.”

In a separate story published in October 1960, Scheuer spoke to Miller and Montgomery Clift about Paula Strasberg, Monroe’s acting coach. As Clift stated, “If the public and the film industry ever allows her to shed her identity as a hip-swaying, blonde bombshell, she has a better-than-even chance of becoming one of the most accomplished actresses on screen! Her professional image was mishandled by her discoverers in their rush to catapult her to fame. … I think they were mesmerized by the breathy quality of Marilyn’s voice, by her body, and her beauty. So they proceeded to transform her into a delicate clock movement. They were more engrossed in the way the pendulum swung than with the intricate things beneath the surface.”

Points of Interest

‘Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid’ and ‘Cisco Pike’

On Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, the New Beverly will be showing a double-feature tribute to Kris Kristofferson with Sam Peckinpah’s 1973 “Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid” and B.L Norton’s 1971 “Cisco Pike.”

Peckinpah’s “Pat Garrett,” with a screenplay by Rudy Wurlitzer (who we mentioned just last week regarding his 1987 film “Candy Mountain”), has had an interesting release journey. A recent Criterion Collection set included three versions of the film. (Based on the running time, it seems the New Beverly 35mm presentation will be the 1973 theatrical cut.) In narrating the story of how two old friends (Kristofferson and James Coburn) find themselves as rivals on opposite ends of the law, Peckinpah created one of his most emotive and sincere films.

As Kevin Thomas wrote in his original review, “Never before has Peckinpah depicted his recurrent theme, the death of the Old West, to suggest so strongly that it also signifies the beginning of the end of freedom in America — and therefore its demise too. ‘Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid’ is not against law and order but quietly questions whom it serves. … Beyond evoking the passing of the old order and questioning the quality of the new one, Peckinpah prompts us to reflect on what civilization itself is.”

In an extensive report from the film’s production in Mexico, The Times’ Robert Hilburn captured the scene as Bob Dylan was on set to play a small role (he also composed the film’s score). As Wurlitzer said of Peckinpah, then in his prime, “All of his energy, his perspective is fundamentally the vision of a pioneer. His anger and his rage are essential components of his work. He’s dogmatic, emotional. The set is a kingdom, and he’s the king.”

Meanwhile, “Cisco Pike” features Kristofferson as a down-and-out rock musician who has turned to dealing drugs. With supporting performances from Gene Hackman, Karen Black, Doug Sahm, and Harry Dean Stanton, the film is a snapshot of early 1970s Los Angeles. As Sean Howe wrote about the film in 2006, “It belongs in a pantheon of films — along with ‘Sunset Boulevard,’ ‘Mi Vida Loca’ and ‘Valley Girl’ — that have managed to capture fleeting pieces of the L.A. landscape that no longer exist.”

‘They Came Together’

To celebrate the 10th anniversary of “They Came Together,” a spoof of romantic comedies directed by David Wain, Vidiots will host two screenings on Tuesday with Wain and cast members Amy Poehler, Cobie Smulders, Melanie Lynskey, Ed Helms, and others in attendance.

The film was the successor to Wain and co-writer Michael Showalter’s “Wet Hot American Summer,” made with many of the same cast members who, in the intervening years, had become considerably more famous. In an interview in Park City when the film first premiered at Sundance, Wain said, “It does create a challenge for us to not mislead an audience into thinking it’s a quote-unquote real romantic comedy. Paul and Amy could easily star in a legitimate romantic comedy.”

Wain added, “Ultimately the goal is not to make a statement about genre or anything like that. The goal is to entertain and make people laugh and tell a fun story. And the guiding principle to that end was that we really do on some level follow and get involved in the relationship. And I think the way you do that is casting Paul Rudd and Amy Poehler. For my money, it really does both, it undercuts it while also allowing you to root for them to get together.”

Andrea Arnold’s ‘Bird’

Filmmaker Andrea Arnold returns with “Bird,” her first fiction feature since 2016’s “American Honey.” The new film premiered earlier this year at the Cannes Film Festival and was recently nominated for two European Film Awards and six British Independent Film Awards. In “Bird,” a 12-year-old girl, Bailey (Nykiya Adams), lives with her immature father, Bug (Barry Keoghan), in a rough-and-ready apartment as he plans to marry his current girlfriend (Frankie Box). Concurrently, Bailey befriends a mysterious drifter named Bird (Franz Rogowski). Bailey finds herself torn between love for her father and a longing for a more stable life.

In his review of the film, Robert Abele wrote, “Arnold has made the lingering beauty and vulnerability of the animal world a hallmark of her tales and ‘Bird’ is no exception … It’s the humans, though, that you’ll remember from the ground up: Adams’ camera-friendly energy and hard-earned serenity; Keoghan’s skewed warmth, just this side of threatening; Rogowski’s odd, commanding woundedness. If it’s too much to ask of Arnold that her bid for heightened naturalism make a ton of sense, ‘Bird’ at least maintains a heartbeat of ache and affection for youth in all its roughness, revealing a filmmaker who isn’t afraid of losing her claws if she traffics in the thing with feathers.”