While One Battle After Another leans into making a joke, exaggerating characters, it feels at times like a lengthier SNL skit cross-bred with Tarantino, which may work well for some but not others.
One Battle After Another is a lengthy action drama tackling identity, parenthood, and what makes an act revolutionary. It features a star-studded cast, mixing industry veterans acting alongside newer castmates. But all of them create an unforgettable film. However, there are questions around how racism plays out in the movie. While One Battle After Another leans into making a joke, exaggerating characters, it feels at times like a lengthier SNL skit cross-bred with Tarantino, which may work well for some but not others.
Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson (There Will Be Blood, Punch-Drunk Love) and written by Anderson, and inspired by Thomas Pynchon’s novel Vineland, it follows revolutionaries coming together to rescue one of their own’s teenage daughter when a militant racist, Steven J. Lockjaw, played by Sean Penn (Mystic River, Licorice Pizza), kidnaps her. The cast includes Teyana Taylor (A Thousand and One, Straw) as freedom fighter Perfidia, Leonardo DiCaprio (Killers of the Flower Moon, Don’t Look Up) as partner in crime, Bob, and Chase Infiniti as their abducted daughter, Willa. Bob recruits the help of his daughter’s martial arts teacher, Sergio St. Carlos, played by Benicio del Toro (Sicario, No Sudden Move).
One Battle After Another Shows Joke Hit Harder in Hindsight
While there is humor in the inane, hypocritical, ludicrous sentiments and beliefs of the religiously racist, there is also harm in making them a joke to such a degree that it downplays their danger. That’s what it currently feels like with these skits. After all, they are in power while we laugh at folks making fun of them, so the joke’s on us. One Battle After Another is a smokescreen of depth, but it’s far more shallow, albeit funny. There is plenty of laughs within its almost three-hour runtime.
More of the Same
Another issue is the depiction of Perfidia. One Battle After Another shows Perfidia, a Black woman, how most people, especially white men, view all Black women. Perfidia is frenzied, careless, and so hypersexualized that she wants it anywhere. It’s a shallow stereotype of Black women. For Perfidia, her whole identity is her sexuality or what feels good, allowing little else to infiltrate. Are there other Black women characters? Yes. Does that excuse this? No because they all lack range. Regina Hall (Honk for Jesus. Save Your Soul., Little) as Deandra is barely present and underutilized, too. Other movies capture the depth and nuance of Black women, Black culture, and more.
There is literally a scene with Bob, the white man, trying to reason with her because she wants sex next to an explosion Bob created. They have to leave so they don’t get caught, yet Perfidia persists, painting her as feral. So much so that she soon becomes jealous of her daughter because of the attention the baby—her baby—receives. If the depiction of characters like Sean Penn’s Lockjaw is the excuse for Perfidia, it’s a false equivalency.
Runtime Drags at Times
The runtime is not awful. However, there were scenes that either went too long or felt unnecessary. A slow-motion scene here and there did nothing except present a look. But the most annoying is the car chase. It went on for an interminable length of time, eventually deflating the tension, bypassing it, and leaving annoyance in its wake.
In a climate where white men reign supreme, receive canonization, and are victims when they cause harm, One Battle After Another shows revolution without being revolutionary. It’s both sidesism in film form. It does not detract from stellar performances. Teyana Taylor does a lot even with so little. Chase Infiniti is sensational and has a promising future in film.Plus, Benicio del Toro’s performance is cool as a cucumber, creating a hilarious contrast between Sergio and Leonardo DiCaprio’s Bob. One Battle After Another has inescapable flaws—particularly in its depiction of Black women—but is also entertaining with immense performances across the board.
