This is Tarantino Takes Over Sky Movies.

I'm your host, Quentin Tarantino.

And the movie I chose for tonight is Paul Thomas Anderson's "There Will Be Blood".

I think, uh, "There Will Be Blood" is definitely one of the best movies made in this last decade.

And I couldn't be prouder of saying that.

Paul is one of my best friends.

And I would say he's probably the current filmmaking artist out right now.

Who I consider the most contemporary, the most friendly competitor.

And I'm glad to be making movies in the same time as Paul. Many people consider "There Will Be Blood" to be his masterpiece.

And I'm afraid I still have to choose "Boogie Nights" over "There Will Be Blood".

As exquisite as "There Will Be Blood" is, I still prefer the exuberance of "Boogie Nights" over the formalism of "There Will Be Blood".

But, the thing about "There Will Be Blood", aside from the obvious things like Daniel Day-Lewis's towering performance, one of the things that struck me after I saw the film, which by the way, if ever there's a movie that demands to be seen twice, if not more, but definitely needs to be seen twice before you can really have an intelligent discussion about it, it would be "There Will Be Blood".

I mean, it's so overpowering that really to truly try to talk about "There Will Be Blood", even a few days after seeing it, you know, probably would amount to gibberish until you've seen it a second time.

But I did try to talk to Paul about it that very night after I had seen it.

And one of the things I said to him is, you know, Paul is a very cinematic director.

And like me, he enjoys indulging in set pieces.

And the first time I saw it, I was like, wow, there was really no cinematic set pieces in the movie, you know.

And Paul was, oh, thank you, Quentin.

I take that as a compliment.

I go, well, you may be the putting out of the fire, maybe.

He goes, well, if there is one, I guess maybe that would be it, as Paul replied. Well, then I saw the film again, and I was completely wrong.

The putting out of the oil fire is absolutely positively a set piece.

It's a brilliant cinematic set piece, you know, from the time that the oil derrick explodes into the time that the soundtrack kicks in, which is, by the way, I think one of the most modern, one of the great modern original soundtracks, you know, to be done of this last decade.

But once that music kicks in and you see Longview running with the little boy, then, you know, it's on.

That is a cinematic set piece.

It's just, you know, it's just different from the set pieces he indulged in in both "Boogie Nights" and "Magnolia". Yeah, there's been so many things already said about Daniel Day-Lewis' performance that I won't just add any more, you know, vomit of praise upon it because it's just, it's, there are facts.

Water is wet, the sun is hot, and Daniel Day-Lewis in this film is great.

I will point out one little tiny thing, though, that's very interesting, is just a little nuance.

The opening 20 minutes of the movie, which is, you know, more or less silent, is actually quite terrific.

But one of the things to take in is when Daniel Day-Lewis' character breaks his leg in the mine and finds the gold.

Look at that surrounding, the surrounding landscape around him, those rocks.

It seems like he's out in the middle of nowhere and it doesn't show his journey back to town.

But that journey back to town literally would be a movie unto itself, you know, similar almost to the Richard Harris movie, "Man in the Wilderness," because literally he's got a broken leg.

He would have to actually, through those rocks, actually have to have drug himself by his elbows, miles and miles through the roughest terrain you can imagine until he finally got to the town and actually sought medical care while having to actually leave the gold that he found.

That's not a contrivance.

That's not a misstep.

Daniel Day-Lewis' performance so embodies the character that you can imagine he did just that.

And also, as much of a bastard as this man proves himself to be, that courage that it would have taken to do that actually gives him the heroic right for almost everything that he does throughout the rest of the movie.

He went through hell to get this fortune.

He is not just a blood-sucking businessman, even though the film does work very wonderfully as, not even a metaphor, as text for the beginning of capitalism in the Industrial Age.

But the fact that the man actually would be able to accomplish such an act almost gives him the right for everything that follows down the line.

And the fact that Paul didn't need to show it, you have to make that movie into yourself, I think is actually quite profound.

Not only that, if you actually even jump to the next scene, which would be the scene where he's laid out on the floor, his leg in a splint, him sitting on some sort of a stretcher, and they're counting the gold dust on the scales.

Look at Daniel Day-Lewis.

Even having gone through all that and laying flat on the floor in a stretcher, he's still keeping an eye on them.

He's not that happy about these guys touching his gold.

He's making sure that nobody gets swifty fingers here.

And it plays lovely. If I had a criticism about the film, it would fall to Paul Danham's performance.

Not that the performance is bad, there's nothing bad about it.

It's just, it doesn't seem a compromise.

He's just not in the level and the caliber of Daniel Day-Lewis.

And if the two characters are meant to be combats throughout the film, then Daniel Day-Lewis is Muhammad Ali and Paul Danham is Jerry Corr.

And it's, you know, it is what it is. I have to say that the relationship I enjoy with Paul is probably my most cherished relationship that I have with another filmmaker.

We are very friendly combatants.

The way we look at it is, we have a Marlon Brando, Montgomery Cliff-like relationship.

I feel I'm Marlon Brando, Paul's Montgomery Cliff.

And the reality is, Brando was better because Montgomery Cliff existed.

And Montgomery Cliff was better because Brando existed.

And nothing makes me happier than for Paul to come out with a masterpiece like "There Will Be Blood".

And nothing makes me happier.

I couldn't be more pleased for him, proud of him.

And nothing inspires me more to do better.

So I can actually say, while there is no thematic link to my new movie, "Inglourious Basterds", with "There Will Be Blood", there is...

If I reach high points with "Inglourious Basterds", it is partly because Paul came out with "There Will Be Blood" a couple of years ago and I realized I had to bring up my game. "Inglourious Basterds".