There Will Be Blood director Paul Thomas Anderson’s new film, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, had its world premiere this week, and critics can’t hold back in their first reactions.
The new action thriller One Battle After Another co-stars Sean Penn and Benicio Del Toro, and a brief synopsis reads: “When their evil enemy resurfaces after 16 years, a group of ex-revolutionaries reunites to rescue one of their own’s daughter.”
The New York Times believes the $140 million movie is set for Oscars glory, while IndieWire called it “the best movie released by a major American studio since I started working as a critic [in 2010]. Distressing how little else comes to mind!”
The film has also been highly praised by Steven Spielberg himself.
Speaking at a Q&A with Anderson at the Directors Guild of America theatre in LA, Spielberg said: “What an insane movie, oh my God. There is more action in the first hour of this than every other film you’ve ever directed put together. Everything, it is really incredible. This is such a concoction of things that are so bizarre and at the same time so relevant, that I think have become increasingly more relevant than perhaps even when you finished the screenplay and assembled your cast and crew and began production.”
One Battle After Another is released in UK cinemas on September 26, 2025.