“There Will Be Blood,” 17 June 2008 (2007), DVD. We both were fascinated by this brutal Paul Thomas Anderson character study of greed and falsehood based very loosely on Upton Sinclair’s “Oil”. Starring Daniel Day Lewis in a brilliant star turn (Oscar, 2008, Best Actor) as the obsessed oil man, Daniel Plainview, the film chronicles the similarities between capital and religion and the cultural connection in American life. But the two characters they focus on are themselves outliers of their respective breeds. They are essentially anomalies and caricatures. Not that they don’t exist, but they are too weird to truly represent anything. The supporting cast is excellent, especially Paul Dano (the son in “Little Miss Sunshine”) as identical yet utterly dissimilar twins, one the self-absorbed faith healer, as he makes his fortune off of others, the other a total opportunist and individualist. A remarkable study that somehow fails to hold together in the last 20% of the film, becoming less powerful as it moves into the emptiness of a Citizen Kane (Caine?)-like mansion but with more direct brutality, cruelty and emptiness. The first 80% of the film is a genuine stunner. See this one