Who is Paul Thomas Anderson? The name might not ring any bells for blockbuster fanatics, but for film buffs, it will chime a deafening roar. He’s one of the most sophisticated auteurs around—one of those filmmakers you know will make your theatre visit worthwhile, boasting what cinema is truly capable of without all the cheap thrills and tawdry spectacle.
Ludicrously good and rightly cherry-picked for every best-of list regarding 21st-century cinema, “There Will Be Blood” plays host to iconic lines like “I’ve abandoned my child!” and “I drink your milkshake!” A roving, full-blooded specimen of cinematic grandeur, this period drama is ripe for the picking and refuses to rush—like nature itself. It takes its time to perfect completion, unhurried and is sure of itself. The silence never feels empty; in fact, it’s bursting at the seams with tension, texture, and half-smiles that could cut the heart right out of you.
There are a few qualities to be found in Anderson’s filmography—precious gems, ready to be uncovered as a reward for sitting through some ambitious run times. Sleek, choreographed cinematography and color grading; silence, still shots, and slow-burns; not-quite-natural or all-out absurdist moments; individual stories told with epic scale (often intertwining); period and postmodern settings; and anti-hero characters we love to hate. Such as Joaquin Phoenix’s alcoholic, hot-headed navy veteran in “The Master” (2012), his unambitious stoner detective in “Inherent Vice” (2014), Mark Wahlberg’s coke-addled porn star in “Boogie Nights” (1997), Adam Sandler’s socially awkward man-child in “Punch-Drunk Love” (2002), Daniel Day-Lewis’ cold-to-the-touch dressmaker in “Phantom Thread” (2017), and of course, his oil-drilling egomaniac in “There Will Be Blood.”
Set in the late 1800s, Daniel Plainview is an “oil man” who—like every other oil man or business tycoon—cares for quite literally nobody but himself (though he’s well-versed in pretending otherwise), like Charles Foster Kane, but without the glittery social life. The only possible exception to this rule is his adopted son H.W. (Russell Harvard / Dillon Freasier), who Plainview uses to present himself as a “family man” to customers and takes the ‘world is cruel, better get used to it’ approach to fathering.
Getting in the way of Plainview’s silver-tongued oil-drilling mission is Eli Sunday (Paul Dano)—an appropriately named preacher in Little Boston. The unlikely enemies lock horns under the initial guise of civility as Eli demands funding for the Church in exchange for his oil-leaking land. Plainview is ruthless in his plot for liquid gold, which comes with a heftier price tag than he expected. Eventually, it leaves Plainview knocking around a huge, lonely mansion with nothing but his booze and blood-stained bowling pins.
Plainview is a famously villainous protagonist who plays a game of mental chess—of ruse and manipulation—and uses physical violence and crime to get what he wants. Day-Lewis and Dano elevated the film to new heights with their performances, and “There Will Be Blood” has been garnering nonstop praise since its release in 2007.
If you’re any kind of cinephile, you probably can’t get enough of “There Will Be Blood”—so here are some similar titles to tickle your taste buds. Whether by theme, setting, style, topic, or character, these ten movies share some of the traits that made “There Will Be Blood” such a knockout vision of the American Frontier.
10. Truth and Justice (2019)
In Estonia, everyone knows A. H. Tammsaare—author of the country’s literary crown jewel, “Truth and Justice,” divided across five books (1926-1933). Writer/director Tanel Toom had his work cut out for him when adapting the first volume of Tammsaare’s pentalogy into a m. Still, you wouldn’t suspect such an uphill journey behind the scenes as “Truth and Justice” is executed with clean precision. The emotive epic is filled with the essence of memory, a farm owner toiling to fix up his marshy hilltop land and ward off nosy neighbors in 1870. Okay, maybe nosy is putting it lightly—they’re really out to get Andres (Priit Loog) and take his property. Andres’ intransigent commitment is admirable but nonetheless ignorant. He’s more committed to his beloved land than his actual family, who he fails to see struggling in their new home.
If Plainview fits the bill of an obsessively ambitious Scorpio sign, Andres is a Capricorn through and through: stoic, hardworking, and determined. He keeps his emotions in check to appear strong and always ready. Both power-hungry Zodiacs demonstrate similarities between Andres and Plainview, and they’re just on opposite sides of the good guy/bad guy coin. And, of course, there’s the crucial overlapping element of an overblown land ownership dispute. Although “Truth and Justice” is specific to Estonian history, values, and stereotypes, the crux of the story is universal, and viewers need not have read the books (which, of course, are a lot richer, but you can’t expect over 500 pages of detail to fit into one movie!)
9. First Cow (2019)
Kelly Reichardt is the woman behind two of our dusty 19th-century picks, and we can only assume she is a fan of “There Will Be Blood.” A24’s “First Cow” basks in its Oregon Country backdrop, luxuriating in the sound of wishing riverbeds and singing crickets, contemplative and intentionally paced. The plot is simple enough: two men steal milk to make and sell biscuits. But these aren’t any old biscuits—they’d put Girl Scouts to shame and cause a war to break out in the neighborhood bake sale.
In fact, customers are almost always warring over the last crumb of Cookie and King-Lu’s buttermilk recipe—a traveling chef and Chinese immigrant, played by John Magaro and Orion Lee. The thing is, they have to steal the milk from a near-sacred cow owned by the wealthiest man in town (who’s obviously English, played by Toby Jones). Then, when the Chief Factor hires Big Cook and Little Cook to bake for himself, things start to get…complicated.
The dreaminess of First Cow’s first half unravels because the net that always lies inevitably traps the characters in a problem of their own making (“Oh, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice deceiving”). That said, nothing about the film feels confused or convoluted, and Cookie and King-Lu’s touching friendship remains at the heart of “First Cow”…rather than the actual cow on the cover. “First Cow” might be less brutal and villainous than “There Will Be Blood,” but they have tons in common: the Western American period setting, the patient plotting, the still shots, and the criminal enterprise. Sure, baking cookies is no oil magnate’s crusade, but the way they’re doing it is still illegal; it requires underhanded methods and local trickery. Will they make it out unscathed? Watch and find out!
8. Dry Summer (1963)
Oil runs thicker than water, but both can be the cause of strain when someone claims ownership of it. Set in a rural Turkish village, a greedy tobacco farmer—perhaps even more greedy than Plainview— discovers a spring on his land and decides to covet it from his neighbors. Drought is just about the worst thing for a farmer, which Osman (Erol Taş) knows and uses to eliminate the competition. He forces his little brother Hasan (Ulvi Dogan) to play along too.
Malignant protagonists and desert plains aside, “Dry Summer” is comparable to “There Will Be Blood” by its chief plotline of one man trying to control the supply of what’s underground (oh, and some explosions). The big finale, where Osman and Hasan have it out once and for all, swaps Anderson’s bowling alley and wordplay for fresh air and the wails of an un-widowed wife but still echoes There Will Be Blood’s pinnacle resolution where only death can stop the central feud.
Agriculture and property laws sound dull, but they clearly make for some good cinema, based on what Anderson and “Dry Summer” director Metin Erksan have produced. It’s the perfect catalyst for conflict, where polite disagreements landslide into bloody warfare in a possessive pursuit of riches and dominance. After all, power struggles are at the heart of most gritty movies!
7. Meek’s Cutoff (2010)
Oregon is Reichardt’s location of choice, almost obsessively setting her auteur movies against the dehydrated climate— ”Old Joy” (2006), “Wendy and Lucy” (2008), “Night Moves” (2013), and of course, “First Cow.” “Meek’s Cutoff” is named after an off-branch route of the famous Oregon Trail, where emigrants took their wagons on a life-or-death journey. Reichardt’s 2010 Western takes to the Oregon Desert in 1845, where real-life fur trapper Stephen Meek (Bruce Greenwood) leads a lost band of settlers.
A recurring motif in Reichardt’s canon is the exploration of (strained, complex, unreliable, surprising) relationships. Unlike the sweet nature of Cookie and King-Lu, the rapport between the itinerant characters is tense and skeptical. The group’s fate lies in the hands of an eccentric stranger and their Cayuse captive that Meek is desperate to kill, and the wives have no say in the matter. Distrust and ill-ease disrupt the tranquil—if overbearingly dry—landscape, but Reichardt still takes time to honor the beauty surrounding them. The whinny of horses, the rustle of leaves during golden hour, the crunch of creaky wheels over gravel…
The imagery is made all the more beautiful by an Academy ratio (authentic to the old Western standard), which also appeared in “First Cow.” The famous cast list may surprise you if you haven’t heard of “Meek’s Cutoff” — Michelle Williams, Shirley Henderson, Zoe Kazan, Greenwood, and, oh yeah, Paul Dano – star of “There Will Be Blood” himself; this time without the oversized crucifix around his neck.
6. Giant (1956)
When it comes to James Dean, most people think of “Rebel Without A Cause” (1955) or “East of Eden” (1955), but “Giant” also earned Dean an Academy Award nomination. Released after his death, “Giant” stars Dean as the ranch hand part of a Texan love triangle—a role he looks born to play, from his muscular arms to his upbringing on a farm in Indiana. The rugged Jett falls for a married socialite (Elizabeth Taylor), and just to annoy her wealthy landowning husband Bick (Rod Hudson) even more, he strikes oil on the property Brick wanted to buy. Jett makes no bones about hiding his oil-greased luck and throws a huge party where drunken brawls, rejected proposals, and a peppering of racism threatens to ruin the good vibes.
Directed by George Stevens, gender roles and worn-out conservative mindsets are put to the test in “Giant,” as it was released on the horizon of a liberating counterculture era. The romance and sweeping visuals of classical Hollywood make “Giant” a treat for any old soul—and one that Martin Scorsese admits is his “guilty pleasure” movie. Shots of Dean covered in tar-like oil call to mind Plainview smoking his pipe through blackened sweat, and both films have a wide-open feel about them despite “There Will Be Blood” not technically being an “epic.”
Also related to movies like There Will Be Blood (2007): All Paul Thomas Anderson Movies Ranked
5. Matewan (1987)
John Sayles’ “Matewan” recounts the true story of the Battle of Matewan coal miners’ strike in 1920 (with a dash of fictional melodrama, of course). The strike unfolded in the hills of West Virginia, where four random men from different paths of life band together against a beefy coal company. The little guy going up against industry giants, fighting for their rights despite the towering threats—we’ve seen it in “Erin Brockovich” (2000), “Dark Waters” (2019), “North Country” (2005), “Silkwood” (1983), “Blue Collar” (1978)… and a lot of other films, actually. “Matewan” is more raw than most of these titles, championing the usual grey tones of realism that mirror the coal-stained characters.
Social Realism loves to get straight to the point, and the effect hits harder without any lingering fingerprints of Hollywood glam. John Sayles is a big name in independent film circles and perfectly matched to relay the true hardship of mining communities in 1920, plagued by pay cuts and poor working conditions. The opening of “There Will Be Blood” follows Plainview digging for silver in a pit, dialogue-free for fifteen minutes. Similarly, “Matewan” is near-wordless in its first scene, where a man struggles beneath the ground, lit only by his headlight amid the rocky earth. The plot doesn’t reflect “There Will Be Blood” so much besides two opposing forces and the topic of land (jagged with coal or glowing with green trees rather than dust-kicking Californian heat). Still, it wouldn’t be surprising to learn that “Matewan” influenced Anderson.
The less-is-more delivery, cinematic style, and enthusiastic preacher character (though Matewan’s is fourteen) are some other common attributes of “Matewan” and “There Will Be Blood.” Plus, all the men are, at one point or another, covered in black muck that mingles with the perspiration of hard labor.
4. Paris, Texas (1984)
Back then, filmmakers did everything they could to make their footage look crisp, clear, and contemporary. They wouldn’t believe you if you said modern movies are often trying to do the opposite—square ratios, stock instead of digital…the grainier, the better. Even teens posting TikTok of their friends use old VHS filters. If you’re a fan of said film grain, why not watch it in its original form rather than modern replicas? The visuals in “Paris, Texas” crack and pop with analog noise, fluttering with the “cigarette burns” David Fincher points out in “Fight Club” (1999). The 80s neo-Western is a Palme d’Or-winning cult classic, roaming through the Texan desert at its own pace, minimalistic, with no need to explain itself, much like “There Will Be Blood.”
“Paris, Texas” is a film that couldn’t be set anywhere but America—the space, sand, cowboy hats, highways, and peep shows. It might not be the American Frontier, but the debris of its dream lives on, lost like the souls haunting its story world. Everything feels a little vacant, a little distant, and a little unresolved. Like a once busy holiday resort, it’s emptied out and rusting in the off-season. As if caught in a daydream of the past. In fact, everything is the past in “Paris, Texas.”
The emotions in Wim Wenders’s partial road movie are more melancholic and transient than “There Will Be Blood” —more resonant and less biting. The blood is metaphorical, whereas Plainview really does have red on his hands, forming a black paste with the smudges of oil. But still, in both of them, complicated feelings live inside complex, not-quite-explained characters. These are characters who dwell in still, wide-open plains, the echo of the American Dream in the West hanging in the atmosphere…
3. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007)
You loved “There Will Be Blood,” and you loved “Paris, Texas.” Now, get ready to love “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford,” which marries the two perfectly. The abstract, strung-out nostalgia of “Paris, Texas,” is given a more literal Old West backdrop, adapted from Ron Hansen’s 1983 novel of the same (long) name. History meets myth meets folk song meets fiction in Hansen’s account of the guerilla outlaw Jesse James, who rubs shoulders with figures like Billy the Kid, Bonnie and Clyde, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. In Andrew Dominik’s unique movie adaptation, Jesse is played by Brad Pitt and Robert Ford—the man who idolized and then shot him—by Casey Affleck. Some other big names dot the credits, but it doesn’t feel like Hollywood. It feels like poetry.
A standout study piece for anyone pursuing cinematography, “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford” takes almost three hours to depict Frontier savannahs inhabited by murderous characters without straight-cut motives, exactly two minutes less than “There Will Be Blood.” The tale of train robberies, bounties, and shoot-outs is told with blurry lens flares and a (somehow) mesmerizing yet matter-of-fact narration by Hugh Ro. The narration is hushed, with bursts of bloody Wild West action. Sound familiar?
2. The Treasure of Sierra Madre (1948)
A lot of these movie picks go at a drifting speed, and this one is quite literally about drifters. John Huston bragged about more than one magnum opus in his career (his directorial debut was “The Maltese Falcon” in 1941, after all), and “The Treasure of Sierra Madre” is one of them. It’s a diamond (or should we say treasure?) of Hollywood’s Golden Age, starring Humphrey Bogart and Tim Holt as two roughneck laborers who hear pub talk of gold mining in Mexico and decide to try it out for themselves.
What would you do for gold? Clearly, men of the 19th and 20th centuries would do anything for it, as the protagonists of “The Treasure of Sierra Madre” and “There Will Be Blood” essentially sell their souls for money (or the stuff underground that can make money). Plainview is more calculated in his liquid treasure-hunting, whereas the characters in “The Treasure of Sierra Madre” act impulsively in reaction to their increasingly high-pressure surroundings. After all, lies, traitors, thieves, stalkers, criminals, and killers lurk among the dangerous Mexican mountains.
Both are allegorical fables on the hollow reward of a ruthless pursuit for riches, though Huston’s tale is a little more on-the-nose about it. Clint Eastwood is an icon of the Western genre, and the fact this is one of his favorite movies proves it must be good! Quentin Tarantino’s had a pretty successful stab at Westerns, too, with “Django Unchained” (2012) and “The Hateful Eight” (2015), so his love for “There Will Be Blood” is further evidence that both movies deserve a spot on your watchlist.
1. No Country for Old Men (2007)
The grand finale of “No Country for Old Men” parallels that of “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford”: both are vague, open-ended scenes overlayed with lyrical but abrupt narrations. “He was fixin’ to make a fire somewhere out there in all that dark and all that cold, and I knew that whenever I got there, he would be there. And then I woke up,” is the conclusion to “No Country for Old Men,” and the latter follows as: “Robert Ford would only lay on the floor and look at the ceiling, the light going out of his eyes before he could find the right words.”
The epilogue-like closures stem from both movies originating as books and finishing up with themes of light in the darkness, metaphysical worlds (dreams, the afterlife), and the feeling of not coming back from somewhere. It’s slow-motion, visionary, and reflective (like “Paris, Texas”) but blunted with the sober, down-to-earth tone of the narrators. This dance between plain-speaking directness and melodramatic riddles can be found in “There Will Be Blood,” which fluctuates between red-faced sermons and grave metaphors to complete silence.
“No Country for Old Men” is also economical with its dialogue, featuring men of few words on their quietly bloodthirsty quests. Josh Brolin plays the Texan welder outrunning Javier Bardem’s eerily calm hitman, with Tommy Lee Jones chasing their tails wearing a Sheriff badge. It’s one of the Coen brothers‘ most famous movies, who’ve also successfully produced Westerns like “True Grit” (2010) and “The Ballad of Buster Scruggs” (2018). Although we’ve tried to identify lesser-known titles that compare to “There Will Be Blood,” it’s simply impossible not to mention “No Country for Old Men” on this list!
