There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007)

[Applesauce]

It also played without a beginning title card at the Castro in San Francisco.

[mfunk9786]

I don't ever remember seeing a title at the beginning still, just took everyone's word for it

[Cold Bishop]

There was always a title! One of my first thoughts on leaving the premiere was that I wished it hadn't: There Will Be Blood popping up after the final bloodshed would have been perfect. But alas...

[mfunk9786]

From another forum:

So I was listening to the commentary on the new Cabin Fever Blu-ray last night. It's a recently recorded cast/director commentary that isn't particularly entertaining or enlightening. Probably due to the fact that the original DVD already contained five commentary tracks to varying success... all that was left was for the cast to get together and complement each other on what a terrific job each one of them did and what gyms they attend.

So Eli Roth begins to pad out the commentary with Tarantino anecdotes, and none of them are particularly new, either... except for this:

Tarantino showed Cabin Fever to PTA who loved it and went out of his way to tell Roth he'd seen the film four times and that he rarely watches any film that much.

Fair enough. But here's where it goes off the fucking rails:

When TWBB was released, Roth saw it, loved it, but was taken aback by the ending. Why? Because DDL proclaims that Paul was the chosen one and Eli was the fraud and Roth thought this was PTA's dig at him. Add to this the fact that the scene takes place on a bowling lane and Roth has a massacre scene in Cabin Fever that takes places in a bowling alley.

So Roth asks QT if PTA is mad at him, QT texts PTA, PTA replies something charming blah blah blah.

So... fucking seriously... Roth was certain the ending of Blood was directed squarely at him.

(It's not.)

[zedz]

I think the credibility of that anecdote went south as soon as it got to "Paul Thomas Anderson absolutely loved Cabin Fever."

[domino harvey]

He is best buds with Tarantino, it only stands to reason that they have similar tastes in some arenas. Still, that anecdote warrants a text spittake more than once

[flyonthewall2983]

I find it a bit charming when directors of some notable acclaim are found out to like crap. Apparently Kubrick loved sitcoms and Wally Pfister said Christopher Nolan is a big Michael Bay fan.

[mfunk9786]

Is Cabin Fever really considered to be crap? I thought it was really well reviewed upon release.

[flyonthewall2983]

I've never seen it, but the idea that PTA watches slasher movies lends itself to that idea.

[Matt]

This thread certainly has taken a strange turn.

I've never seen it, but the idea that PTA watches slasher movies lends itself to that idea.

I don't even know what that sentence means.

[knives]

I wouldn't call Cabin Fever a slasher anyway as there is no killer. It's a little awkward and I'm too sensitive for it anymore, but it is mostly a pretty good scare flick with some humour.

[zedz]

Is Cabin Fever really considered to be crap? I thought it was really well reviewed upon release.

It's more like just a completely ordinary, nudge-nudge-I-saw-these-cool-80s-movies-on-video genre exercise, without much in the way of scares or originality. It's a very hard film to imagine anybody (except for Eli Roth) becoming wildly enthusiastic about.

[flyonthewall2983]

I've never seen it, but the idea that PTA watches slasher movies lends itself to that idea.

I don't even know what that sentence means.

I never have seen Cabin Fever or any of Eli's work. I'm not a big fan of horror films, so calling it what I did was more of a throwaway line. I just meant I find it interesting/appealing that a director with the acclaim PTA has gotten over the years, doesn't find it beneath him to enjoy more pulpy or even commercial fair.

[colinr0380]

Didn't we all know that Anderson liked crap because he knew about Adam Sandler's oeuvre?

I quite liked Cabin Fever, although it has a lot of strange tonal shifts and stuff meant to be comedic/surreal/references to backwoods films like Deliverance that make for memorable moments but eventually work against it really having much of an impact. It does have some musical numbers by David Hess though!

[Grand Wazoo]

Here is the first episode of the I Was There Too podcast featuring Paul F. Tompkins speaking about his time on set for There Will Be Blood

[ianthemovie]

It's been three years but I now have a definitive answer to my question about the opening title card. I went to a screening of a 35mm print of the film last night and sure enough the title card was there at the beginning, accompanied by the music, just as I had remembered! Not sure why they would have taken it out for the Blu-ray.

[hearthesilence]

I wonder how that happened. A tiny change, but to make any change in a master requires either a good deal of effort (going back and recutting it, which isn't so simple - it means redelivering a new master to numerous parties involved) or a significant error (accidentally grabbing the wrong cut/master). Regardless, I'm guessing either Anderson changed his mind about something, or (hopefully not the case) they used an alternate that wasn't his final approved version.

[Roger Ryan]

It's been three years but I now have a definitive answer to my question about the opening title card. I went to a screening of a 35mm print of the film last night and sure enough the title card was there at the beginning, accompanied by the music, just as I had remembered! Not sure why they would have taken it out for the Blu-ray.

Yet, as shown here, the title is found on the home video version (with the music under it). I thought the question was whether the title was shown theatrically - some, including myself, do not recall seeing the title prior to the fade in on the landscape.

[PfR73]

It's been three years but I now have a definitive answer to my question about the opening title card. I went to a screening of a 35mm print of the film last night and sure enough the title card was there at the beginning, accompanied by the music, just as I had remembered! Not sure why they would have taken it out for the Blu-ray.

The music is there on the Blu-Ray. I previously wrote that the opening title card was silent, but since then I've gotten a new sound system & moved from an apartment to a house where I can listen to movies at a higher volume. I just re-checked the Blu-Ray & the music begins during the Miramax logo & continues to play underneath the opening title. The dynamics on the home theatre mix may be different than how it sounds theatrically or the theatres may just be playing the sound louder overall, but it's there.

[mfunk9786]

I don't remember there being a title card during the theatrical release, and I saw it a month prior to release and a few more times after the release. I didn't see a title card until the home video release (aside from the one before the credits). Another change for home video: Some overdubbing when Eli's being dragged through the oil. In the theater, it was "You owe the Church of the Third Revelation... five thousand dollars!" and I guess PTA saw fit to change it to "You owe the Church of the Third Revelation... five thousand dollars... as part of the agreement that we made!" It doesn't sound all that natural, to be quite honest, and I wish the change weren't made because it's rather distracting.

I've seen this movie way too many times.

[aox]

I definitely remember the title card in the original run. I probably saw it within two weeks of its release in NYC. The type-face struck out to me at the time as setting the time period. I remember thinking, "am I seeing a horror film".

[ianthemovie]

I remember thinking, "am I seeing a horror film".

To which the answer is yes!

I went back and looked at my Blu-ray, and sure enough the title card and music are there, so now I really feel crazy. The music begins very soft under the title, so maybe it's possible I just didn't have my speakers turned up loud enough to hear it before.

[Constable]

I watched the TWBB yesterday and there's one scene that has me puzzled as to what the poitn of it was. It's the scene when Plainview catches the little blonde girl who's running around with the other kids and tells her his father will not beat her any more or something along those lines. What was that about?

[Roscoe]

It was a callback to the moment earlier in the film where HW tells Plainview that Mary (the little girl) has told him that her father (who is the guy who sold them the property they're drilling on, and is Eli/Paul's father as well) beats her. Plainview's little bit of nice-making with her ("do you like your new dress? aren't you glad I came?") leads into "no more beatings" just loud enough for her father to hear -- he's the guy sitting nearby who gives Plainview the stink-eye.