Can't you turn off the pager for about 2.5 hours of the day? I am certain you had it on vibrate.

Saw it sunday. Couldnt take my eyes off the screen. This was the first movie ive seen in a while where i didnt fidget around in my seat trying to get comfortable or get up for refills. Whole movie was so intense i havent been able to stop thinking about it. Cant wait to watch it again.

EXACTLY the way I felt after seeing it a couple weeks ago!

I cant wait to see it again too!

I did, but these were big money clients and I had to reach them back. I'll definitely have to go back next week.

That's understandable. I have seen people standing outside the movie theater in the lobby talking to people on their cells, glad they have the decency to leave. I remember once I had a day off work and was trying to watch Terrence Malick's New World when my phone vibrated and I wound up going in for half a day. Since that incident, I keep my phone OFF for a film viewing. If it's off for a little less than three hours, people buy that it just wasn't charged.

Back to the movie, is there anywhere to get a copy of the Upton Sinclair novel "Oil!" ? I got one from my library that looked as though it was still held over from the days in which it was published. Only one in the city of Knoxville too. Had to return it for a hold request, undoubtedly caused by the movie. What I read of it didn't seem like it had much to do with the film other than just giving it some inspiration.

http://headcomix.info/forum/index.php?topic=190.30
"I think I saw all of the nominated films, except Atonement, and I am not impressed. Even though several people I know liked (loved) "There will be blood" I didn't. First, many points of the movie seemed illogical or not fully explained. Also, in my other life, I read Sinclair's "The Jungle" This movie just did not seem like a Sinclair novel. So, I googled the summary of the book "Oil",Now I know why I felt that the movie had some many flaws. It was not the book. Sinclair usually attacks the big companies and not a minor player. The movie went after Plainview (Mr. Ross in the book)
and his relationship with his son. First, the book was an expose of the Southern California oil industry and invloved bribery of politicians and alluded to the Teapot Dome Scandal. Second, while I didn't understand the relationship between father and son in the movie, in the book the father was an oil tycoon and the son was a socialist (millionaire) who was constantly fighting with his father over organizing the poeple who were raped by big oil. In essence, the movie was almost a white wash of Standard Oil and it completely ignored the fight against such companies. I felt a similar annoyance when I saw that McCarthy movie by Cloney. It was McCarthy lite. Get the DVD for Point of Order to really understand tail gunner Joe."

I don't know if this is your post from another forum or just something you cut and pasted from someone else but: How about judging the film for what it was, and not what you thought it should have been? To me, it's the laziest thing in the world to just dismiss a movie because "it didn't follow the book." What flaws did the movie have exactly, aside from the fact that it didn't cleave to the book? This movie was a character study, not a history lesson on the burgeoning oil companies.

Wasn't my post, cut and pasted because I came across it and was closely related to the question asked.

Haven't read the thread yet, but finally saw this last night.

A masterpiece.

They should just rename the best actor Oscar the Daniel Day-Lewis Award.

I cannot wait to hear his acceptance speech.

I drink your OSCAR!!!!! I DRINK IT UP!!!!!

So in turn you'd rank it the cinematic equivalent (or worse) of From Justin to Kelly? Wow. Just.. Wow.

I would say you are a troll. There are times I don't like a movie and it isn't a movie I would call bad my any means. Sometimes there are movies I might even say are good but I just don't like them.
Syriana and Michael Clayton are recent examples of this. I think they are both incomprehensible and boring and slow but i can still tell they are well made and well-acted films and for that alone i would at least give them a 5.
You can say what what you want if you dont like it (although I do struggle to see how someone who has an interest in film cannot see the brilliance of this film) but it is technically perfect. Acting, directing, dialogue, sound etc. is all top notch.

^ Good comments....NO ONE should put this on the same level as say a Uwe Boll pile.

Similarly, I didn't like Brokeback Mountain, but I could appreciate that it was well directed, well acted and deserves credit for that.

I saw it on Friday and thought about it all weekend. I will be watching it before the Oscars, but I will wait a week or two before doing so.

Looks like you and I will be rooting, again, for the same film come Oscar time. Just like in '05 with Crash. Except this time, I don't think we'll have to defend our choice quite as much.

Seeing as how Sinclair's novels were mostly simple-minded attacks by a socialist on what he (not very accurately) thought capitalism was, I'm glad the movie was changed so much. The Sinclair origin scared me a bit but I thought the film was a masterpiece.

There are (obviously) good capitalists and bad capitalists. Seeing a movie about a bad one, especially one done as masterfully as this one, is no problem. If one wants to see stupid movies that simple-mindedly attack capitalism itself I'm sure there are plenty of Soviet propaganda and Oliver Stone films still out there.

You are correct. Technically, this movie is a masterpiece.

Unfortunately, movies are supposed to be more than technical contraptions.

This is the beautiful empty-headed dazzler of the year. Next year she'll get all fat on you and you'll realize how stupid she is.

So explain why please; you haven't yet mentioned why you think the movie is empty-headed, stupid and worthy of a score of 1.

If he did it with the Daniel Plainview voice and managed to include the slurping sound in the middle, it would be considered the greatest acceptance speech of all time.

You must be new to the thread.

Dig around above, I've made detailed comments.

OK, thanks. Could have done without the snark, but point taken.

Haha true....I really hope this one does well, but Im just not sure. I wonder how well it would resonate with Academy voters.

When Crash won, I really thought about the age of the voters and who they are (older men mainly). I just didnt think Brokeback would win them over completely and Crash had a bigger chance than people thought.

This year, No Country For Old Men and There Will Be Blood seem a bit similar in their appeal though. Its going to be very interesting indeed.

We could be looking at another split! NCFOM winning best director and TWBB winning best picture. OR, they could look at the best actor award as TWBB's recognition.

I guess it also depends on how well the films are screened (I havent seen a screener for TWBB on the net yet!). I wonder how hard the studio is pushing TWBB?!?

I would say Paramount will push TWBB quite a bit. I'm still pissed they let Zodiac drown.

This could certainly be another year where there's a BP/Director split. They won't be sharing many awards since they are going against each other in several categories. TWBB is by itself for Art Direction.

I think the DGA award is this Saturday, so that may give us some insight for who the frontrunner is.

TWBB had a very late start during the Oscar season compared to No Country and still managed to land an equal number of nominations. I'm still confident with the Editing rule, meaning only these 2 films have a chance of winning BP. I think whomever takes Editing on Oscar night goes on to win Picture. But that doesn't always match up.

I know each will have at least 1 acting win. Then that leaves the chance of them splitting the BP/Director award or one of them just outright sweeping. Should be a very interesting show, if they have one.

Didn't mean to be snarky; I meant to channel all negativity towards the film.

The thing cost me $30 and 3 hours.....the only plus is that my date also hated it, and afterwards we watched Hostel 2 on video and agreed that it said more about the evils of capitalism than TWBB.

But I don't think TWBB was supposed to be about the evils of capitalism; it was about the character of Plainview, who was a completely obsessed son of a bitch. There wasn't a single scene in the movie that he wasn't a part of; we never left his side, not even to see where H.W. went to school or what the executives of Standard Oil were up to. The movie was a character study, that just happened to take place at the beginning of this oil mining era. His character could have been easily transplanted to being obsessed with gold or silver or iron ore, but since the starting point was Upton Sinclair's book, it just ended up with oil. And yes, it is about America at that time, that was rapidly become more and more capitalistic and corporate, but the movie's focus was on Plainview and his rise and fall during that time. Plainview was who he was because he chose to be that way (or because he was that way all along), not because capitalism caused him to be that way.