I believe that PTA IS the greatest young director we have produced (though I think there's some guys - like Cuaron and del Toro out of Mexico or Bielinsky out of Argentina who are just as good...this will be the decade of "Latin American Cinema"), but I'm always surprised that people bring up influences like Altman without bringing up Scorsese. "Boogie Nights" owes itself, more than any other film, to "Goodfellas" (and to a lesser extent "Raging Bull"), with the aggressve camera-work, the FANTASTIC editing, and musical imprint, and PTA's greatest asset is his incredibble ability to know where to put the camera and what to do with it, like Scorsese. While someone like Sofia Copolla has a gift for composition and Tarantino can load a image with references, PTA is absolutely brilliant with understanding composition, movement, color, and sound. THIS is why people think he's so grandiose, because very few people can infuse all these elements into a complex whole and when people do it consistently, it can feel epic.

I haven't loved everything he's done (I've never felt the pressure a filmmaker must feel to be great ooze through the screen like I felt when I watched "Magnolia"), but I've never seen a young director of this generation who understands filmmaking so thoroughly as PTA. I can't wait to see "There Will be Blood."

Just saw "There Will Be Blood" and left the theater rather depressed.

Of course Daniel Day Lewis is fabulous and amazing; his ability to create a larger than life character is unsurpassed. The scenes are provoking and capture the brutality of the work and the starkness of the life.

This is contrasted against Daniel Plainview's love for his son. I really couldn't comprehend Plainview's complete descent ... it didn't seem adequately "set up" to me. I didn't really understand how the character got to where he gets. The trajectory didn't seem to me that he'd ultimately have to end up on the dark side.

What I'm not understanding about this director is this total infatuation with the abyss and nihilistic outcomes. WIth all of the talent to pull together a production with terrific acting and that so vividly evokes a time, place and mood, the director seems to throw it away by wallowing on the dark side.

The idea of a great picture to me is one where there is redemption. In this and "No Country for Old Men" (the other vyer for the top picture prize this year, which also had a totally bummer ending), it seems the idea of redemption is anathema. Perhaps this is some sort of reflection on the state of our national psyche.