movie review

Intense One Battle After Another ranks as one of 2025's best movies

Leonardo DiCaprio in One Battle After Another.

Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures

The only thing predictable about writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson is the unpredictable nature of the movies he chooses to make. The same man has made films featuring the porn industry, 19th-century oil drilling, a veiled story about Scientology, and a ‘70s-set rom-com. His new film, One Battle After Another, features another hard left turn, this time into the world of revolutionaries that just might be a very timely political critique.

The sprawling film begins in an incendiary manner, with Bob (Leonardo DiCaprio), his romantic partner Perfidia (Teyana Taylor), and other members of a group called the French 75 raiding an immigration detention camp in the U.S., overwhelming the small military presence and freeing detainees. Perfidia has a charged encounter with Colonel Steven J. Lockjaw (Sean Penn) during the raid, setting in motion the main thrust of the film.

When Bob and Perfidia have a baby, Bob wants to pull back on their dangerous activity, while Perfidia wants to continue. The two go their separate ways, with Bob raising Willa (Chase Infiniti) away from his former comrades. But Col. Lockjaw’s feelings over his experiences with Perfidia and Bob remain strong after many years, and he uses his position of authority within the government and with another shadowy organization to try to track them down.

That bare-bones synopsis does little to describe just how intense, funny, and bonkers the nearly three-hour film actually is. Very loosely based on the 1990 Thomas Pynchon book Vineland and made well before the re-election of Donald Trump, the film nonetheless has certain sections that feel like a strong denunciation of the current administration’s immigration policies. And while those parts will undoubtedly set tongues wagging on both sides of the aisle, Anderson doesn’t get bogged down in politics.

As in every film he’s made, Anderson’s best skill is in creating memorable characters. Bob is a somewhat dim-witted guy whose addiction to pot injects a lot of comedy into the film. Perfidia is a strong-willed woman willing to do anything to get her way. Col. Lockjaw projects strength, but is actually a weak man who needs to have his ego massaged. The film is full of smaller characters who make big impressions no matter how much screen time they have.

The one constant throughout the film is the persistent score by Jonny Greenwood, who’s now done six PTA films. When the second half of the film turns into one long action scene, Greenwood’s music makes it even more intense. It culminates in a final sequence featuring one of the most memorable car chases in recent history, with Anderson’s filmmaking and Greenwood’s score combining to make something masterful.

In recent years, DiCaprio has seemed to delight in playing people who are off-kilter, and his performance here is as funny as it is compelling. Penn gives him a run for his money in that department, using a halting gait, weird mouth movements, and a general strange vibe to create an instant classic character. Taylor, Infiniti, Regina Hall, Benicio del Toro, Tony Goldwyn, and many more make the supporting cast as important as anything else in the film.

Anderson has tended to look to the past during his career, but with One Battle After Another — which takes place over the course of 16 years or so — he speaks more to current times than anything he’s ever made. While it has themes of political dissent and government overreach, it’s also about the strength of family units and people standing up for what’s right. All of that and more makes it one of the best movies of the year.

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One Battle After Another opens in theaters on September 26.

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Movie Review

Over-the-top thriller The Housemaid revels in camp, chaos, and excess

Photo courtesy of Lionsgate

Amanda Seyfried and Sydney Sweeney in The Housemaid.

Both Amanda Seyfried (the upcoming The Testament of Ann Lee) and Sydney Sweeney (Christy) are starring in movies with Oscar ambitions this year. By sheer coincidence, the two actors are also co-starring in The Housemaid, a thriller coming out within weeks of their more ambitious works, one that is likely to be seen by many more people than those prestige plays.

Sweeney is given top billing as Millie, a down-on-her-luck ex-convict looking to land any type of job so as not to break her parole. She finds a too-good-to-be-true lifeboat with Nina (Seyfried), who hires her to be a housemaid for her large house on Long Island, where she lives with her husband, Andrew (Brandon Sklenar), and daughter, Cecilia (Indiana Elle).

After a warm interview, Nina almost immediately becomes highly erratic, whipping back-and-forth between happy-go-lucky and rageful. It seems clear that Nina is suffering from mental health issues, as she’ll often accuse Millie of misplacing or stealing items that she didn’t take. Andrew, apparently used to Nina’s tirades, tries to protect Millie from the worst, something that grows increasingly difficult as Nina ups the ante.

Directed by Paul Feig (A Simple Favor) and adapted by Rebecca Sonnenshine from the bestselling book by Freida McFadden, the film is likely the trashiest mainstream movie to come out in 2025. The first half of the movie relies not on story but on moments as Nina embodies the word “hysterical” to an unbelievable extent. The resigned acceptance of the abuse by Millie, as well as the saintly patience of Andrew, make almost every scene laughable, as nobody seems to be acting anywhere close to how a person would normally react to such extreme situations.

The scenes and the performance of Seyfried are so over-the-top, in fact, that it’s clear that the filmmakers are in on the joke. It’s next to impossible not to have a little bit of fun while watching the actors react to outrageous incidents as if nothing is out of the ordinary. The worse Nina acts, the more Millie and Andrew retreat into their chosen roles, and the funnier the film becomes.

Fans of the book will know that the story changes course, eventually turning into a more stereotypical thriller that also has some relatively gnarly visuals to offer. But the trashiness continues, with Sweeney’s, um, assets repeatedly on display in both clothed and unclothed ways. The sex appeal of the R-rated movie makes it an outlier, as recent studio films have shied away from asking their big stars to disrobe completely.

Both Seyfried and Sweeney are far from their Oscar hopeful roles here. Seyfried is given free rein to act as brazenly as she pleases, and she takes full advantage of that ability. Sweeney seems to have been told to be much more reserved, and unfortunately that results in too many wooden line readings. Sklenar continues his breakout streak (It Ends with Us, Drop) with a role that allows him to show more range than either Seyfried or Sweeney.

The Housemaid is an unusual type of movie to be released at a time of year when most films are either those aiming for awards or more family-friendly fare. Despite its many flaws, it’s still an enjoyable watch that features a variety of crazy scenarios not typically seen in movies nowadays.

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The Housemaid is now playing in theaters.