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Abstract

mile and soft-spoken words, more money and influence over oil operations. Each time Daniel acquiesces, Eli, like a parasite, gains more influence, power, and hunger, which he uses to cajole and then extort Daniel.Until his son goes deaf, Daniel seems unbothered by Eli’s power-hungry antics. He treats him with the same professionalism he does with other business partners.After striking oil, Daniel pummels Eli and drags him across the oil field in front of his workers. Daniel mocks Eli’s supposed supernatural powers, asking Eli why he doesn’t make his son’s deafness go away.Daniel also breaks his composure at a business meeting when H.M. Tilford, representing Daniel’s main competitor in the area, Standard Oil, suggests Daniel sells his land and go take care of his son. Daniel perceives this as an insult and responds accordingly, turning down the deal, shouting at Tilford, and threatening to slit his throat.<h1 id="08ea">Did Daniel ever care about Eli?</h1>We might think Daniel attacked both Eli and Tilford out of insecurity that he couldn’t provide for his son as a father. He was reluctant to send H.W. away.However, it’s not clear if this is Daniel’s main motivation when we see how he treats H.W. later in the movie.After welcoming H.W. home from boarding school, Daniel immediately takes him out for a fancy meal. Daniel is affectionate and forgiving of H.W.’s surliness, but it turns out Daniel timed the meal, and perhaps H.W.’s return, to coincide with a lunch that Tilford has with his associates. We never learn who they are because every time Tilford tries to introduce them, Daniel shouts, asking Tilford if he sees his son and rubbing his independent success in Tilford’s face. Daniel uses H.W. at this moment to make a point, the same way he’s always used the boy for publicity.Daniel’s motivation is even more suspect when we consider he only brings H.W. home after others guilt him for abandoning him. Daniel himself shows no remorse for sending young H.W. away, except for briefly asking if H.W.’s room was large enough for him.At the end of the movie, adult H.W. tells his father he loves him but is moving to Mexico to start his own oil drilling company. Despite H.W.’s pleas that they re-build a loving relationship, Daniel spurns H.W., declaring him a competitor. He also cruelly reveals H.W.’s truth: that he’s an orphan Daniel took to conduct business.Clearly, Daniel is power-hungry and aggressive, but his offences against H.W. might seem a bit more forgivable if we think of him as a single father trying to figure out parenting — if not for a key detail from the night of the explosion: after recovering H.W. and getting him to a safe place, Daniel rushes back out to check on the drill. The situation is nothing his men can’t handle: they’re already cutting the wires that keep the drill upright. The conflagration doesn’t seem urgent, either: they wait until the next day to extinguish the fire when the drill doesn’t fall. After cutting the wires, Daniel looks up at the burning drill and smiles at the “ocean of oil” he’s found beneath his feet, with seemingly no urge to go back to H.W.<h1 id="479c">Eli’s Demise</h1>Throughout the movie, Eli repeatedly tries to one-up Daniel by leveraging the power he has as the leader of the church that Daniel built for him. Most notably, when Daniel agrees to baptism in order to build a pipe through the last parcel of land in the area, belonging to the devout Brandy family, Eli seizes the opportunity to humiliate Daniel in front of his congregation. He forces Daniel to repeatedly beg forgiveness for abandoning his son and slaps “the devil” out of him.Clearly, Daniel resents this moment because he mirrors Eli’s tactics before killing him 16 years later. When Eli s

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eeks Daniel trying to a business deal, once again leveraging his influence with the devout Brandy family, Daniel agrees under the condition that Eli admits he’s a false prophet and that God is a superstition. Only after Eli shouts this repeatedly does Daniel inform him that his business proposition is moot because the brandy land has already been drained of oil. Daniel then uses gruesome imagery to describe how Eli is nothing compared to his “brother, Paul.”The movie seems to imply that Eli has some sort of split personality or alter ego he resents. Earlier in the movie, Young Eli assaults his father, saying that the stupid man and his stupid son, Paul, let the oilman walk all over them by inviting him, only to sell their land to him for so cheap.It’s unclear when Daniel finds out Eli thinks of Paul as a brother, as opposed to simply an alias he used to shield his identity. Maybe Daniel, seeing so much of his power-hungry, insecure, misanthropic self in Eli, simply guesses. We also know from when Paul and Daniel first met that Paul (and Eli) resents being treated like a fool.Daniel’s words make their mark: it visibly pains Eli to hear himself described as the afterbirth that slithered out after Paul; it pains him to hear the true prophet is not he but Paul, for predicting his land had oil.We might have thought Eli would come to claim the throne from Daniel, apprentice surpassing master, but the movie ends with Daniel beating him over the head like a cockroach. Eli was never a rival, but a nuisance.<h1 id="5c0d">What about Daniel’s brother?</h1>Just as H.W., Eli, and Tilford reveal Daniel’s dark nature, another reveals potentially the only genuinely, unconditionally compassionate side of Daniel. Right after Daniel strikes oil, a man shows up claiming to be his brother. After Daniel finds out the man is pretending to be someone else, he kills him. However, he seems genuinely distraught while reading over the diary of the man who could have been his brother.In some sense, that we see vulnerability here shows us that even a ruthless businessman has a heart for family. It humanizes Daniel by showing his need for genuine connection.However, given everything else we know about Daniel, it’s also likely that this is a sign of his narcissism: he only cares about people who are related to him by blood. When spurning adult H.W., Daniel repeatedly emphasizes that H.W. has no drop of Daniel in him, implying he has no loyalty or obligation to the young man.Daniel doesn’t cry when H.W. leaves him as a child, he doesn’t cry when H.W. leaves him as an adult; he doesn’t cry when he kills Eli. The only spilled blood that Daniel sheds tears for is his own.<h1 id="5400">More Monster than Flawed Man</h1>Throughout the movie, we see how Daniel collects contempt the way others collect pebbles. Just like pebbles become hotter the longer we hold them, Daniel’s contempt for those that wrong him builds over the years. Although some of his love for H.W. may have been genuine, he resents H.W. for no longer being useful to him; he resents the man who impersonated his brother for trying to fool him; he resents Tilford (and the big business tycoons he represents) for questioning his competence, and he resents Eli for trying to one-up him.Daniel’s character arc mirrors that of Walter White from Breaking Bad. Both seem to be polite and civil but gradually reveal themselves to be monsters, waiting for an excuse to be unleashed.Does the brutal grind of capitalism create men like Daniel Plainview, or do these men build and spur capitalism with their inhumane greed? The movie gives us enough hints to show us. Although capitalism gave it the water to grow, Daniel’s monstrosity was rooted deeply within him.</article></body>

Flawed Man or Monster? — “There Will Be Blood” Analysis

Whose blood is Daniel Plainview willing to spill?

The movie’s title signifies a promise: “There Will Be Blood.” We see right this in the opening scene when a worker is killed in an oil well. Based on the novel “Oil!” by Upton Sinclair, the movie is a critique of the dehumanizing cost of unfettered capitalism. The title change from the novel to the movie implies the phrases are synonymous: oil demands a sacrifice.

Less clear, however, is the direction of causality: does unfettered capitalism turn men into monsters, or is it the monsters who build and spur capitalistic systems?

Is the main character Daniel Plainview a good guy gone bad, a bad guy whose mask started to slip, or something in between?

The Civil Oilman

Throughout the movie, we see how Daniel draws blood, figuratively and literally, in order to build his oil empire. At first, these incidents seem like unfortunate mishaps, a cost of doing business, and Daniel responds to each of them with grace and composure. He somberly adopts the baby that was orphaned by the accident in the opening scene, giving viewers a sense of Daniel’s compassion and responsibility. He raises the boy, H.W., as his own and showers him with affection. When a man dies later on his oil field in Little Boston, Daniel arranges a funeral and makes sure to send personal items back to his family.

Daniel is charming with all his business associates, including people whose land he wants to buy. Sure, we see him embellish his success; we see him make grand promises to the folks of Little Boston when he tries to buy their land for undiscovered oil, but nothing seems inordinately inhumane for a working man trying to provide for his family of two. Daniel may use the boy to frame himself as a family man and score lucrative contracts, but at this point, he’s somewhat redeemed by taking H.W. into his car in the first place.

The Pivot Point

As the movie progresses, Daniel’s role in the blood spill becomes more direct and deliberate. One incident triggers the shift in both Daniel’s character and his fortune: he strikes oil, and H.W. goes deaf from the ensuing explosion.

For the first time, we see the charismatic businessman lose his composure, in private and in public. It starts when H.W. hums, trying to hear himself, and Daniel raises his voice to tell him that’s enough. After a lifetime of keeping H.W. by his side, especially when negotiating deals, Daniel starts to spike H.W.’s milk with alcohol, forcing him to drink it, and keeping him in bed. Daniel abruptly sends H.W. away to boarding school for deaf children when the young boy starts to misbehave (by setting their cabin on fire).

Daniel’s professional persona starts to slip, too. Until he strikes oil, Daniel is gracious and magnanimous when dealing with the difficult Eli Sunday, a young man who continually (and unsuccessfully) tries to extract more and more money from Daniel in return for tipping him off to Little Boston’s untapped oil. We see this right off the bat when Eli first approaches Daniel. Cleverly, Eli avoids giving away too much about where he lives — only enough to hint at “an ocean of oil” underneath — until Daniel agrees to pay $500. He doesn’t even give Daniel his real name, introducing himself as Paul.

As Daniel examines Little Boston and then drills it, Eli demands, with a smile and soft-spoken words, more money and influence over oil operations. Each time Daniel acquiesces, Eli, like a parasite, gains more influence, power, and hunger, which he uses to cajole and then extort Daniel.

Until his son goes deaf, Daniel seems unbothered by Eli’s power-hungry antics. He treats him with the same professionalism he does with other business partners.

After striking oil, Daniel pummels Eli and drags him across the oil field in front of his workers. Daniel mocks Eli’s supposed supernatural powers, asking Eli why he doesn’t make his son’s deafness go away.

Daniel also breaks his composure at a business meeting when H.M. Tilford, representing Daniel’s main competitor in the area, Standard Oil, suggests Daniel sells his land and go take care of his son. Daniel perceives this as an insult and responds accordingly, turning down the deal, shouting at Tilford, and threatening to slit his throat.

Did Daniel ever care about Eli?

We might think Daniel attacked both Eli and Tilford out of insecurity that he couldn’t provide for his son as a father. He was reluctant to send H.W. away.

However, it’s not clear if this is Daniel’s main motivation when we see how he treats H.W. later in the movie.

After welcoming H.W. home from boarding school, Daniel immediately takes him out for a fancy meal. Daniel is affectionate and forgiving of H.W.’s surliness, but it turns out Daniel timed the meal, and perhaps H.W.’s return, to coincide with a lunch that Tilford has with his associates. We never learn who they are because every time Tilford tries to introduce them, Daniel shouts, asking Tilford if he sees his son and rubbing his independent success in Tilford’s face. Daniel uses H.W. at this moment to make a point, the same way he’s always used the boy for publicity.

Daniel’s motivation is even more suspect when we consider he only brings H.W. home after others guilt him for abandoning him. Daniel himself shows no remorse for sending young H.W. away, except for briefly asking if H.W.’s room was large enough for him.

At the end of the movie, adult H.W. tells his father he loves him but is moving to Mexico to start his own oil drilling company. Despite H.W.’s pleas that they re-build a loving relationship, Daniel spurns H.W., declaring him a competitor. He also cruelly reveals H.W.’s truth: that he’s an orphan Daniel took to conduct business.

Clearly, Daniel is power-hungry and aggressive, but his offences against H.W. might seem a bit more forgivable if we think of him as a single father trying to figure out parenting — if not for a key detail from the night of the explosion: after recovering H.W. and getting him to a safe place, Daniel rushes back out to check on the drill. The situation is nothing his men can’t handle: they’re already cutting the wires that keep the drill upright. The conflagration doesn’t seem urgent, either: they wait until the next day to extinguish the fire when the drill doesn’t fall. After cutting the wires, Daniel looks up at the burning drill and smiles at the “ocean of oil” he’s found beneath his feet, with seemingly no urge to go back to H.W.

Eli’s Demise

Throughout the movie, Eli repeatedly tries to one-up Daniel by leveraging the power he has as the leader of the church that Daniel built for him. Most notably, when Daniel agrees to baptism in order to build a pipe through the last parcel of land in the area, belonging to the devout Brandy family, Eli seizes the opportunity to humiliate Daniel in front of his congregation. He forces Daniel to repeatedly beg forgiveness for abandoning his son and slaps “the devil” out of him.

Clearly, Daniel resents this moment because he mirrors Eli’s tactics before killing him 16 years later. When Eli seeks Daniel trying to a business deal, once again leveraging his influence with the devout Brandy family, Daniel agrees under the condition that Eli admits he’s a false prophet and that God is a superstition. Only after Eli shouts this repeatedly does Daniel inform him that his business proposition is moot because the brandy land has already been drained of oil. Daniel then uses gruesome imagery to describe how Eli is nothing compared to his “brother, Paul.”

The movie seems to imply that Eli has some sort of split personality or alter ego he resents. Earlier in the movie, Young Eli assaults his father, saying that the stupid man and his stupid son, Paul, let the oilman walk all over them by inviting him, only to sell their land to him for so cheap.

It’s unclear when Daniel finds out Eli thinks of Paul as a brother, as opposed to simply an alias he used to shield his identity. Maybe Daniel, seeing so much of his power-hungry, insecure, misanthropic self in Eli, simply guesses. We also know from when Paul and Daniel first met that Paul (and Eli) resents being treated like a fool.

Daniel’s words make their mark: it visibly pains Eli to hear himself described as the afterbirth that slithered out after Paul; it pains him to hear the true prophet is not he but Paul, for predicting his land had oil.

We might have thought Eli would come to claim the throne from Daniel, apprentice surpassing master, but the movie ends with Daniel beating him over the head like a cockroach. Eli was never a rival, but a nuisance.

What about Daniel’s brother?

Just as H.W., Eli, and Tilford reveal Daniel’s dark nature, another reveals potentially the only genuinely, unconditionally compassionate side of Daniel. Right after Daniel strikes oil, a man shows up claiming to be his brother. After Daniel finds out the man is pretending to be someone else, he kills him. However, he seems genuinely distraught while reading over the diary of the man who could have been his brother.

In some sense, that we see vulnerability here shows us that even a ruthless businessman has a heart for family. It humanizes Daniel by showing his need for genuine connection.

However, given everything else we know about Daniel, it’s also likely that this is a sign of his narcissism: he only cares about people who are related to him by blood. When spurning adult H.W., Daniel repeatedly emphasizes that H.W. has no drop of Daniel in him, implying he has no loyalty or obligation to the young man.

Daniel doesn’t cry when H.W. leaves him as a child, he doesn’t cry when H.W. leaves him as an adult; he doesn’t cry when he kills Eli. The only spilled blood that Daniel sheds tears for is his own.

More Monster than Flawed Man

Throughout the movie, we see how Daniel collects contempt the way others collect pebbles. Just like pebbles become hotter the longer we hold them, Daniel’s contempt for those that wrong him builds over the years. Although some of his love for H.W. may have been genuine, he resents H.W. for no longer being useful to him; he resents the man who impersonated his brother for trying to fool him; he resents Tilford (and the big business tycoons he represents) for questioning his competence, and he resents Eli for trying to one-up him.

Daniel’s character arc mirrors that of Walter White from Breaking Bad. Both seem to be polite and civil but gradually reveal themselves to be monsters, waiting for an excuse to be unleashed.

Does the brutal grind of capitalism create men like Daniel Plainview, or do these men build and spur capitalism with their inhumane greed? The movie gives us enough hints to show us. Although capitalism gave it the water to grow, Daniel’s monstrosity was rooted deeply within him.