ONE BATTLE AFTER ANOTHER | ©2025 Warner Bros

Rating: R
Stars: Leonardo DiCaprio, Sean Penn, Chase Infiniti, Benicio del Toro, Teyana Taylor, Regina Hall, Eric Schweig, D.W. Moffett, Tony Goldwyn, Shayna McHayle, Starletta DuPois
Writer: Paul Thomas Anderson, inspired by the novel VINELAND by Thomas Pynchon
Director: Paul Thomas Anderson
Distributor: Warner Bros.
Release Date: September 26, 2025

ONE BATTLE AFTER ANOTHER begins with an attack on a U.S. internment camp along the U.S./Mexico border. The revolutionaries/terrorists (pick your preferred term) threaten but do not shoot the soldiers on the premises while liberating the prisoners, including families with small children. We then follow the militants, who call themselves French 75, as they proceed to vacate and then blow up federal buildings and rob banks.

A lot of people may think with some amazement, “Whoa, this movie is coming out now? Directed and scripted by Paul Thomas Anderson?”

The answer turns out to be yes and no. ONE BATTLE AFTER ANOTHER is coming out now, and it is directed and scripted by Paul Thomas Anderson (the end credits reveal that it’s “inspired by” Thomas Pynchon’s novel VINELAND – a comparison with the book’s synopsis suggests that “based on” might be more accurate). However, it is not at all the movie that first section suggests it’s going to be.

This is actually not all that surprising, as Anderson is known for comedy, satire and drama, but not for agitprop.

Sixteen years after reign and fall of French 75, a voiceover tells us not much has changed in the world. The group’s former explosives expert, Ghetto Pat (Leonardo DiCaprio), is living in the revolutionary/terrorist version of witness protection under the name Bob Ferguson in suburbia, with his sixteen-year-old daughter Willa (Chase Infiniti).

The Fergusons’ lives are more or less conventionally middle-class, though Bob’s drink-and-drug habit is a source of concern to promising high school student Willa. Bob has told Willa an edited version of the past, in which Bob’s adored paramour, Willa’s mother Perfidia (Teyana Taylor), died a hero.

Meanwhile, a long-yearned-for opportunity in the life of U.S. Army Col. Steven J. Lockjaw (Sean Penn), who has a grudge against French 75, has reason to seek out Bob and Willa.

The organization presenting Lockjaw with this opportunity discovers they have a competing need to locate Bob and Willa. This results in multiple individuals and groups alternately chasing and hiding from each other.

DiCaprio is convincingly fatherly, pathetic and frustrated. Penn, for all of Lockjaw’s outsized aspects, commits absolutely to what he’s doing. Infiniti elicits our empathy as Willa. Taylor does justice to Perfidia’s complexity. Eric Schweig makes an impression as a tracker who is getting fed up with everyone. Other notable cast members include Benicio Del Toro, Regina Hall, Shayna McHayle and Tony Goldwyn.

Anderson employs the rarely-used VistaVision format, which looks great. He has a lot of fun with little riffs of weirdness and finds some great locations for action, like the cinematic hills near California’s Highway 78.

The overall effect of ONE BATTLE AFTER ANOTHER is that of a shaggy dog story epic, with Bob trying to rise to the occasion and Willa attempting self-preservation, while finding allies and fending off villainous goons.

Most of the sequences work and fit together successfully enough. There’s so much going on that it’s all watchable. Still, the two-hour-and-fifty-minute running time feels excessive. ONE BATTLE AFTER ANOTHER is diverting, but its tone prohibits us from taking any of it too seriously. Despite its quirky charms, we start to wish it would hurry up well before we reach the finale.

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