Brianland

Casting a Spell

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One Battle After Another is rightly being hailed as a masterpiece for the ages.

I saw it on both opening night and closing night in Toronto on different IMAX screens, plus six more times in between at various other theaters.

Months before it opened, I saw the photo of Leo on the payphone under a headline about the new Paul Thomas Anderson movie (which I hadn’t heard a peep about!) and thought “Wow!  This could be sumpthin!”  I wanted it to be good and smiled at the idea of PTA maybe having a hit movie.  But I had no idea or expectation it would be this good.  And never even dreamed it would win Best Picture from every film organization in the world, as it has.

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I only began my serious Film Studies during the pandemic lockdown.  I’ve studied music from ragtime to the present, and literature, and poetry, and painting from the renaissance to the present, and theater, and standup comedy, and dance to some extent — but for some reason I never got around to film.  But with everything else shut down, and these giant hi-def screens we have now at home, and the ability one way or another to access virtually any movie ever made, plus the wealth of teaching aids on YouTube including StudioBinder and CineFix, and discovering used DVDs/Blu-rays at the thrift stores for a dollar or two now that everybody’s dropping off their collections — suddenly I could attend film school without leaving the room and before leaving this earth.

I’m 5½ years into the journey and among other things I learned how filmmaking is the most collaborative art humans create.  More people are involved in a film than putting on a play or making an album or staging a concert — Taylor Swift’s Era Tour excepted, maybe 🙂 — so by that metric it can be considered the greatest art that humans create.

All of this set me up for seeing One Battle After Another on opening night.  You can (and should if you haven’t) read my short initial review here.  One of things my Film Studies taught me was to see movies that are important on the screen they were created for.  And this is a frickin’ masterpiece of film!  It feels like sort-of the payoff for my years of study.  This is the first film that’s come out since I’ve been deep-diving that’s on the short-list of Greatest Movies Ever Made.

I’ve subsequently watched every interview with PTA or any of the principals that’s available on YT, and read every article I came across about how it was made.  Here’s some things I’ve learned . . .

As of this writing (late January 2026) it’s won Best Picture of the year from 31 different film organizations, and been nominated for 13 Oscars, 14 BAFTAs, and set a new all-time record at the SAGs with 7 nominations including in every category it’s eligible.  When it won Best Picture from the National Board of Review, no less than Martin Scorsese was there to present it, and said of PTA, “He takes great risks and gambles everything from picture to picture. One Battle After Another is a big cinematic canvas that hits the target at exactly the right moment. It’s a picture that has so much in it and contains so much, it can’t be boiled down to one genre or one catchphrase or one element.”

The first element in creating a film is the script, and PTA began working on ideas that would eventually become One Battle as far back as 1999. (!)  He started wanting to do a car chase in the desert (inspired by Vanishing Point) and he wanted to do something with secret societies.  It wasn’t until he read Thomas Pynchon’s Vineland in 2002 that he got the idea of the ex-revolutionary father & daughter on the run.  And he wanted it to have a comedic element a la Midnight Run with De Niro and Charles Grodin.  But he was really struggling with how to structure it until he saw the 1935 Les Miserables with Charles Laughton when he got the idea of the first act prologue that sets up the rest of the story.

Once you have the script and the director — in this case the same person, the very definition of an ‘auteur’ — the next job is casting.  Interestingly, this is the inaugural year (and long overdue) for a Best Casting Oscar, and of course One Battle is nominated, and it should sure win (as you’re about to read) but who knows.

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First you get your lead in place.  Leonardo DiCaprio and Paul Thomas Anderson have known each other since the mid-’90s when they were in their early/mid 20s.  They were in discussion for Leo playing the lead (Dirk Diggler) in Boogie Nights, but he chose to do Titanic instead.  Ever since, they’ve been looking for the right timing and fit, and finally found it with One Battle.  Leo pulled from a lot of places to create to the character, and one he admits happily and with a smile is Jeff Bridges’ the Dude from The Big Lebowski.

DiCaprio is the only actor in history to star in six Best Picture-nominated films in row.  And he and Di Niro are now tied for starring in the most Best Picture-nominated films with 12 apiece.  And he’s now tied Daniel Day-Lewis & Michael Caine for the most BAFTA nominations for an actor (7) and is the youngest to have done so (at 51).

Leo has been involved in the film the longest and he and PTA became pretty close friends thru the process.  If their projects and schedules can line up again, this might not be the only film these two create.

Like basically every actor in the world, Sean Penn wanted to work with PTA. Paul has regularly praised Fast Times at Ridgemont High and he said to himself upon first seeing it that he really wanted to work with Sean.  Penn had a small role in PTA’s 2021 Licorice Pizza, but like with Leo they were finally able to get their schedule’s to line up with this one.  And no less than Steven Spielberg said on stage at the Directors Guild screening that this is his favorite Penn performance of all time.

Speaking of scheduling, they were not so lucky with Benicio del Toro, who was committed to Wes Anderson’s Phoenician Scheme during the shooting of One Battle, but Paul correctly knew he was so perfect for Sensei Sergio that they actually shut down production for a couple months until Benicio freed up.  He then came in with a wealth of ideas about the character, and over dinner with Paul & Leo, they did a massive rewrite of that whole section of movie, coming up with the “Harriett Tubman situation” and the underground network and the buddy road picture aspect.  The entire second floor where Sergio lives was apparently conceived and built by production designer Florencia Martin in a couple of days!  A smart cool line Benicio shared with his director – “If I ever start matching Leo’s energy, stop me.”  Sensei’s other-worldly calmness amidst the chaos is a grounding force for both the audience and the manic story.  And his now-famous line delivered with a smile, “A few small beers” was improvised in the moment.  Benicio and Leo have great chemistry both on screen & off and the cinematic re-pairing of these two has got to be on the minds of every filmmaker in the world!

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The biggest challenge was coming up with a mixed-race actress who could pass for a 16-yr-old. This is very similar to Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds in that that movie could not be made if they couldn’t find a great actor who was fluent in English, German and French. Q said he’d almost given up and was just going to publish the story as a novel when they found Christoph Waltz after years of looking.  Same was true here.  If they couldn’t find a teenage-looking mixed-race actress who could go toe-to-toe with Leo DiCaprio and Sean Penn they couldn’t make the movie.  Paging now Oscar-nominated casting director Cassandra Kulukundis who found Chase Infiniti . . . who had never been in a movie in her life.  It’s an absolutely astounding riveting powerful performance by a 23 yr old (at the time of shooting) who had never set foot on a film set; and it’s an absolute crime to history that she wasn’t one of the five nominated for an Oscar — but at least the Screen Actors Guild and the BAFTAs got it right.

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Regina Hall tells a funny story about how her & Paul are neighbors, and one day he said he wanted to come over, and she knew that he knew she was redoing her back yard, and assumed he was just being a nice neighbor and wanted to see how the back yard turned out.  So, when he arrived, she said, “You wanna come and see the yard!” all excited and led him out there and was explaining each little thing she’d done, and eventually he said, “Can we go in the house and talk?” and even then it never dawned on her that he’d written a script and wanted to cast her in his next movie.  She’s known for doing mainly comedic roles, and PTA is not exactly known for being a comedy director.  But he sat her down . . . and her jaw dropped.

Next in the Amazing Casting Department is the number of musicians cast.  Teyana Taylor, who is now Oscar, SAG & BAFTA-nominated for her performance, and just won Best Supporting at the Golden Globes, is a Grammy-nominated R&B singer.  Also multi-Grammy-nominated Alana Haim of the pop group Haim plays one of the key revolutionaries (in only her second film, after PTA’s 2021 Licorice Pizza).  Rapper Shayna McHayle aka Junglepussy is another revolutionary (in only her third film).  Paul Grimstad has a key role as Howard Sommerville who gives Leo the tracking device and later gets captured and coughs up Bob & Willa’s whereabouts — he is normally a film composer (in only his second acting role).  And one of my favorite characters in the film, Talleyrand, is played by the singer-songwriter & record producer Dijon (in his first and only film role).  So, right there you have casting that is very unusual, bold, and dare I say visionary.

THEN there are INNUMERABLE roles filled by people who do the jobs in real life and have never been in front a camera before.  Along with everything you’ve just read, THIS is why this film deserves the inaugural Best Casting Oscar.  You’ve got multiple movie stars perfectly cast such that they deliver Oscar-nominated performances.  Then you’ve got all these brilliant choices who’ve barely ever been in a film before.  Then a TON of the rest of the characters are cast from regular people who’ve never had an acting class in their life but are absolutely PERFECT in their roles.  THAT’s smart and gutsy casting!

First and foremost is the unformed government interrogator Col. Danvers played chillingly & authentically by former Homeland Security Special Agent James Raterman.  As he tells it, “Randomly out of the blue Paul sends me a text message and says Hey, my name’s Paul Thomas Anderson, I make movies, would I be able to give you call?  I said, Sure, when?  And he’s like, Well, right now.  So, I took the call.  The first time you talk to Paul Thomas Anderson is the same as if you were talking to your best friend for the last 20 years.  He’s that engaging and welcoming and warming.”  He sent the non actor the script, and the rest is Best Picture history.

Then there’s the intake nurse who asks Bob about his diabetes and the nurse who takes off his handcuffs and tells him how to escape — both are real nurses in El Paso.  PTA shared how the intake nurse was completely in control on set, barking at movie star DiCaprio, “Look at me when I’m talking to you.”  The woman who plays Willa’s school teacher, Tisha Sloan, is a lifelong theater actor who’s never been in a film before.  All the families filling Benicio’s sprawling apartment and hallways are also non-actor locals.  Comically, most of the nuns at the Sisters of the Brave Beaver compound are real sisters from the real Sisters of the Valley weed farm in California.  The cops who arrest Sergio are both real LAPD officers; and the two young Snap Crackle Pop boys who use the shortwave to report Sommerville being taken were kids they met while location scouting.  And speaking of location scouting, the store that’s the front for Sergio’s immigrant operation is unchanged from the store they found in El Paso, and they cast the woman who runs it as the woman who runs it in the movie.  As Leo said, “It was guerrilla filmmaking.  It was awesome.”

And then there’s the white supremacist Christmas Adventurers Club, which certainly freaked me out the first time I saw it.  I thought What a strange direction for the film to suddenly take — “Where is this going?!”  The first and main two Adventurers are played with chillingly casual nonchalance by the ever-calmly evil Tony Goldwyn (grandson of the Hollywood mogul Samuel Goldwyn) who first came to fame playing the betraying friend of Patrick Swayze in Ghost.  I had forgotten how seductively he could deliver poison with a smile.

Then there’s Jim Downey the revered Saturday Night Live writer from the year after their founding and on-&-off for the next 30, the longest anyone ever served in that position.  He rarely appears in a dramatic role, and again it’s a testament to PTA’s visionary casting and the casting director.  Downey appeared briefly in PTA’s There Will Be Blood in 2007, but took on a more substantive against-type role in One Battle.  He recently played with Conan O’Brien in an hilariously improvised riff that’s gone viral and generated tens of millions of views and can be seen here. 

And then there’s the surprise appearance of 81-yr-old wheelchair-bound Kevin Tighe who PTA lured out of retirement after having not appeared on screen in nearly 20 years.  He’s a revered theater actor who cinephiles will remember from key roles in John Sayles’ Matewan, and alongside Leo DiCaprio & Johnny Depp in What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, and older folks will have grown up with him on the TV show Emergency!  It’s such a surprise and pleasure to see him back on screen and again speaks to the wide vista of the casting — from first-timer kids to the biggest movie stars in the world to elder giants audiences haven’t thought of in years.

A truism of acting is that good actors make other actors better. And this movie proves the point in spades as the tide of talent raises all boats.

As I noted during my first screening, this is a

One Battle After Another deals with a lot of difficult subjects that major motion pictures rarely touch with a ten-foot pole — white supremacy, authoritarian governments targeting their own citizens for personal vendettas, modern day bounty hunter vigilantes, underground revolutionaries who kill people, traitors turning in their friends for personal gain, sanctuary cities and networks, single-father parenthood, mixed race families — heavy touchy sensitive subjects — and PTA’s brilliant way into all these worlds is to have a light touch with some slightly comic exaggerated characters who make the audience laugh unexpectedly.  Then add to it the most innovative original score this century (by Jonny Greenwood) to propel the action, and edit the whole thing to move at a lightning pace, then cast it full of Oscar-winning actors mixing with regular people playing the jobs they do in real life are probably some of the reasons it’s already won so many Best Picture of the year awards . . . with the real biggies coming shortly.

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“Courage, Bob.”

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Here’s a great short mini-doc on Jim Downey from SNL to today including several PTA deets . . .

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And speaking of SNL, I love their January 2026 parody ad for One Battle After Another action figures!

And speaking of memorable television moments at 30 Rock — I LOVED Taylor Swift’s reaction when she suddenly remembered One Battle After Another was the most recent film she saw!  Her gushing excited demeanor – which is then matched by Jimmy Fallon’s — is a great moment of television — and reflects how this director of a songwriter sees genius in cinema.

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And I love this video someone made of the audience’s reaction and laughing at some funny bits during an early screening . . .

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Or this is a pretty great January 2026 piece by Mojo of why One Battle will win Best Picture . . .

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And here’s where the wise and respected CineFix picks One Battle as the Best Picture of the year . . .

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Here’s my first-blush review after seeing it in IMAX on opening night . . .

Paul Thomas Anderson’s “One Battle After Another” film review — Do Yourself A Favor

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Here’s my master movie page with over 900 entries and cued to the Auteur section . . .

Brian’s “Hot 300” movie list

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Here’s mini reviews of the 14 best movies I watched in 2025 . . .

Best Movies Watched in 2025

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Here’s the most-read piece on my site last year — the time-coded breakdown of A Complete Unknown including all the hard to identify songs, tons of quotes and lots of context . . .

“A Complete Unknown” Scene Breakdown – Time Codes, Song Titles, Quotes & Context

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Here’s a similar breakdown of Peter Jackson’s 2021 The Beatles: Get Back — similarly time-coded, full of quotes and background details … and the second-most-read piece on my site last year . . .

The Beatles: Get Back — Time-Coded and Annotated

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by Brian Hassett

karmacoupon@gmail.com   —  BrianHassett.com

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