Anderson welcomes you to the revolution

Cinema | September 29th, 2025

By Greg Carlson

“One Battle After Another,” the brilliant new masterwork from Paul Thomas Anderson, joins Wes Anderson’s “The Phoenician Scheme” on the short list of the year’s best films. Along with the shared directorial surname and the perfect casting of Benicio del Toro, the two movies balance rich text/subtext with vital father-daughter narratives (not to mention huge laughs and several tears). The films make a handsome double feature. The Andersons are notable cinephiles who constantly pay homage to favorite movies and moviemakers, both famous and obscure. But they are also distinctive individual voices worthy of the auteur label and are among the finest cinematic storytellers working today.

Loosely inspired by Thomas Pynchon’s 1990 postmodern novel “Vineland,” “One Battle After Another” conjures memories of any number of big screen paranoid thrillers that thrust the viewer into a breathless chase broken up by fleeting moments of intimacy and quiet. Anderson’s subject matter suggests the artist is downright clairvoyant. A fried left-wing revolutionary, whose activities would certainly be labeled antifa by the current administration, tangles with an old nemesis and bête noire aligned with a Christian-fascist cabal of powerful racist puppetmasters over the fate of his child, who has grown up without her mother.

With hints of Javert and Jean Valjean represented by the cat-and-mouse pursuit of Leonardo DiCaprio’s Bob Ferguson by Sean Penn’s Col. Steven J. Lockjaw, as well as Hugo’s affinity for marrying political philosophy with themes of familial love (not to mention the author’s emphasis on classic surrogate and blood maternity and paternity), “One Battle After Another” owes something to “Les Misérables.” But equally compelling is Anderson’s instinct for making his viewers believe in all sorts of utterly cartoonish ridiculousness without a whisper of doubt in the emotional authenticity of his characters. In this sense, “One Battle After Another” echoes the frequent modus operandi of Stanley Kubrick, whose “Dr. Strangelove” is paid righteous tribute.

Throughout his entire filmography, Anderson’s passion for actors has manifested in any number of career-best turns. Here, DiCaprio and Penn put on a clinic, going big and going for broke with wild choices wholly committed to the bit and committed to the bite. The wickedly propulsive rhythm of “One Battle After Another” quickens the pulse; absolutely anything could happen at any moment (and often does). But Anderson knows exactly how to nest the anxiousness within the twin pursuits of outrageous laughs and genuine pathos. Many critics have noted poignant autobiographical self-reflection from the father of four. Each and every scene DiCaprio shares with newcomer Chase Infiniti is pure magic and unconditional love.

Even though DiCaprio, Penn and Infiniti form the crucial triangle at the beating heart of “One Battle After Another,” Anderson, true to form, comes up with juicy roles for the rest of the ensemble. Del Toro walks off with every scene in which he appears and Teyana Taylor, as Bob’s lover and collaborator Perfidia Beverly Hills, is pure fire. Even with fleeting screen time, the members of the radical French 75 and the horrifying Christmas Adventurers Club punch well above their weight class. It is impossible to watch “One Battle After Another” without thinking of the current dismal assault on due process, decency and democracy, but Anderson makes good on the ceaseless struggle indicated in his title by crafting something both timely and timeless.

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