Rent One Battle After Another (2025)

Full Tilt PTA: Cinema Doesn’t Get Better - One Battle After Another review by griggs

Now and then, a film arrives that makes the rest of the year feel ordinary. One Battle After Another is that film. Fierce, funny, and politically astute, it belongs in the same breath as Magnolia and There Will Be Blood. For me, it completes Anderson’s set of masterworks, proof that he can balance sweep and intimacy, fury and wit, with unshakable command.

The cast is astonishing. Leonardo DiCaprio sheds his star persona to serve the film. Sean Penn delivers perhaps the most physical, nuanced turn of his career — towering and vulnerable at once. Benicio Del Toro matches him in a quieter register, while Regina Hall brings bite, Teyana Taylor adds spark, and newcomer Chase Infiniti grounds key moments with quiet force. Not a weak link in sight.

Jonny Greenwood’s score is restless and propulsive, echoing the story’s turbulence without drowning it. Shot in 70mm VistaVision, the film looks monumental, every frame scaled to match its ambition.

Even the humour lands — sly, absurd, and sharp, with flashes reminiscent of the Coens at their darkest. To hold levity and rage together this deftly is rare. This is cinema at full tilt: urgent, unmissable, and built to last.

Cars and guns, cars and guns - One Battle After Another review by PH

Cars and guns, is this a reflection of the States today? Overlong, predictable, garbled dialogue, intrusive music, is this the best Hollywood can come up with?

Can anyone tell me how Bob builds a house and supports his family for sixteen years with no income?

Sprawling melodrama that's more breadth than depth - One Battle After Another review by PD

This latest from accomplished director Paul Thomas Anderson packs an awful lot in its long running-time (nearly three hours), with the result that there's much more breadth than depth. Perhaps if it was more focused, or just shorter, Anderson’s message could have been more hard-hitting, but as it is I'm coming away thinking it's ultimately rather superficial despite its best intentions.

It stars of course Leonardo DiCaprio (many names, but usually 'Bob') who's the explosives expert for a revolutionary group called The French 75. After we jump forward 16 years, DiCaprio then spends the rest of the film staggering through the chaos wearing a bathrobe and not making much sense, as though Jeff Lebowski accidentally wandered into “The Battle of Algiers.” It’s not that Anderson lets the film’s politics fade into the background - the film is filled with right wing corruption and farcical portrayals of a secret racist illuminati. But he’s more interested in taking rather-too obvious potshots at the film’s real-world analogues than actually exploring them, and when he does add complexity, that complexity has nothing more than a 'both sides are bad' quality (and sadly he can't portray the film’s one queer character without making them the one person willing to violate the sanctity of 'zip it when questioned by police'). Anderson does commit to portraying White Nationalists as insipid hypocrites who abuse their power, but he also insists tacking on scenes at the end that both strain credulity and add little to the film’s finale. In all, it’s all rather muddled, although to be fair it's perhaps suggesting that America’s political struggles stem from a lack of consistent identity or ideals, or that weekend political warriors are an annoying distraction from real heroes doing real work, like Benicio Del Toro’s karate instructor-slash-underground leader (this sequence is really good, with some very effective dark humour). But the fact that Del Toro’s character genuinely views Bob as the most important person in the room, when clearly he’s not, is a bit awkward.

As with all things Anderson, the film is an ambitious production, both Anderson and cinematographer Michael Bauman do an astounding job of finding epic shots hidden within comedic landscapes, and vice-versa, and the cast is uniformly equipped to tackle this material, although the villain of the piece, Sean Penn's Col. Lockjaw, is more Dick Dastardly than Heinrich Himmler. All in all, watchable enough with some effective sequences but for me ultimately far from Anderson's best work.

An Incoherent Film - One Battle After Another review by SB

From the raucous beginning, in, I assume, an east coast city such as Philadelphia, to its ending with a teenage girl having a shoot-out in a desert somewhere (I know not where), I found this to be a rambling and an incoherent film. Regrettably, I watched it until the end in the mistaken hope that there might be a point to it, and that it might improve. Regrettably, neither happened, and I cannot say that I enjoyed this film, and I certainly could not recommend it.

DiCaprio at the centre of a story about Far Left revolutionaries in today's America - One Battle After Another review by Philip in Paradiso

When the film begins, 'Ghetto' Pat Calhoun, AKA 'Rocketman', AKA Bob Ferguson (Leonardo DiCaprio), is an expert in explosives and a member of a Far Left, anti-capitalist revolutionary group known as French 75. His partner is Perfidia Beverly Hills (Teyana Taylor). The group launches a daring operation against a detention centre run by the government, where illegal immigrants are being kept by the authorities. The camp for the illegal immigrants - or those who are accused of being so and have been rounded up by the police - are Latin Americans; it is guarded by members of a militarized police force. Their commanding officer is Colonel Steven Lockjaw (Sean Penn). The members of French 75 overpower the camp guards and free the detainees. During the operation, Perfidia points a gun at Col Lockjaw, taunting and humiliating him sexually. He becomes obsessed with her and, later on in the story, this becomes an important aspect of the plot, as they - inevitably - meet again.

This is an unusual movie because of its topic, which is not that commonly covered in American films. French 75 has echoes of the Far Left movements of the 1960s, 1970s & 1980s such as the Black Panthers in the USA or the Red Army Faction (RAF) in Germany. (It is not clear when the story is taking place but, judging from the IT and telecoms equipment available to the self-styled revolutionaries, it would be nowadays.) The militants who belong to the movement are a mixture of African Americans and Whites, who want to bring down the American system of government, fight the State and the police, and destroy the capitalist system. As French 75 opts for violence to subvert society, the film turns into a thriller. Despite the fact that the film is highly topical now that Donald Trump is president of the USA, and with the way that he uses the immigration service's enforcement arm (known as ICE) to, in effect, hunt down immigrants and clash with all those who oppose his policy - there are several aspects of the plot that are not entirely plausible.

It is still an excellent film, full of tension and suspense, with an unforgettable climax towards the end of the movie that is bound to become a classic set piece in film. At the centre of the story is Bob Ferguson: whereas his partner, Perfidia, is a highly motivated and fanatical member of the revolutionary movement, it is clear that Bob is getting tired of it all. In the course of the film, he turns into a washed-up drug addict and drunkard who would rather forget all about it, but cannot, as his past eventually catches up with him. Leonardo DiCaprio plays the part of Bob remarkably well and is completely believable as the inept revolutionary who has seen better days. His potential nemesis is Col Lockjaw, played convincingly by a scary Sean Penn, who is some kind of racist, ultra-nationalist, psychopathic white supremacist. Col Lockjaw is nearly a caricature, but no doubt there are many like him out there – and not only in America.

In some ways, the film is interesting because its message is more ambiguous than it seems: viewers may ponder this as they wish, after having seen the movie. In fact, the story is funny in places, if only because there is something comical about DiCaprio's character, forever wearing his dressing gown through thick and thin. So, it is a somewhat unusual film but a very good one, which I would certainly recommend.

One dross after another - One Battle After Another review by JH

Firstly, this film could easily be cut by half an hour with no loss to the storyline. And what a storyline. Like the latest "Knives Out" film it tried to mix humour with seriousness without the necessary lead ins. Names like Perfidia should give you a clue to her character. Lockjaw (stretching believability). Presumably the name of the secret society was meant to be a joke. The really annoying plinky plonky background music at one point went on far too long and forced me into just using the subtitles. Couldn't work out whether Sean Penn's character was meant to be taken seriously or not. I was quite shocked to see such a good actor brought low in this role. And (spoiler alert) when he reappears after apparently having been checked twice to be dead, I laughed out loud. Was that meant to be funny ? Like the whole film, I never worked out what how we were supposed to take it.

Whilst it is not flawless, I was constantly engrossed & moved by the action on-screen - One Battle After Another review by Timmy B

P.T Anderson is someone whose work I have watched for years. He never makes a boring film, in the sense that all his work is in its own ways highly idiosyncratic & unique. And I am endlessly grateful, which is a running theme throughout my reviews, for the people/media which is different from the relentlessly churned-out crap which is released mainly by the big studios. And you could never accuse Anderson of making anything close to that. Whilst I have loved some of his films (Punch-Drunk Love & There Will Be Blood spring immediately to mind,) I have also been indifferent towards other stuff of his (for all it's great content, The Master was far too long, and multiple reviews stated that Inherent Vice was all but unwatchable.)

One Battle After Another I actually saw in 70mm IMAX, such was the hype around it. And when I saw it the first time, despite liking certain elements of it, I was actually fairly indifferent, mainly due to trying to keep track of the multiple strands around resistances & political movements. However, as confirmed by my star rating, my 2nd viewing was far more fulfilling. And I do genuinely like it, despite still having some reservations.

For me, the supporting characters absolutely stole the show. Teyana Taylor & Sean Penn were absolutely brilliant, throwing themselves headlong into this crazy world. The scenes they shared (sadly all too brief,) were amazing. I also really liked Chase Infinity as well. She manages to do something which so many before her totally fail at: not make a precocious teenager so annoying you cannot stand it when they are on screen.

Music-wise, unsurprisingly Anderson has again reteamed with Jonny Greenwood, who has an ability to make some of the most memorable & brilliant scores imaginable. Although nothing comes close to 'Blood's soundtrack, the tracks here perfectly compliment the action on screen.

Not for the first time, as much as he wasn't "bad," Di Caprio for me was the weakest link in this film. He throws himself in with passion and commitment, but like with Gangs of New York, he just didn't click for me. It is yet another role which Christian Bale or Ewan McGregor would have absolutely made their own.

For many people, this film is a masterpiece. And I also feel that as I watch it again (which I fully intend to do,) I may have a renewed appreciation for it. But whilst it is very good, it is by no means the landmark piece of cinema many reviewers proclaimed it to be. But I am endlessly grateful that geniuses like Anderson are given massive budgets to make the crazy & incredible art that seems to spring so effortlessly from their creativity.