One Battle After Another is a film chock-full of unexpected occurrences. It’s unexpected that it would contain the most thrilling car chase of the past few years. It’s unexpected that it would have a scene where a group of middle-aged white men would start their meeting by exchanging Christmas pleasantries, only to then be so disgusted by the existence of the mixed-race child they put a bounty on. It’s unexpected for a place called the “Chicken Licken Frozen Food Farm” to be the pivotal location for the film’s middle act. It’s unexpected that Leonardo DiCaprio would play such a burnout dirtbag after years as the most suave man in the world, a choice that allows him to once again flex his status as cinema’s most unconventionally funniest performer.

And yet, being that this is the year 2025, nothing should really surprise us anymore. One Battle After Another is the apex of a string of 2025 films directly about the 2025 experience. This story involves themes of immigration, liberation, radicalization, and revolution, all seemingly ripped straight from the headlines and gloriously projected onto IMAX screens. The National Guard is dispatched to sanctuary cities, ICE encampments are crammed with unattended children, and marginalization is performed in the open without any remorse.

But by also being a loose adaptation (“inspiration” is the label used in the credits) of the 1990 Thomas Pynchon novel Vineland, writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson illustrates that none of these issues are brand new to the American political landscape. It’s an endless cycle of progress and pushback, with each side digging its heels a little deeper with each subsequent turn. Case in point: The French 75 militant group, and its most outspoken comrade, Perfidia Beverly Hills (Teyana Taylor). The letters and protests weren’t getting the job done, so they’ve been substituted with raids and bombings. The liberation of an immigration detention center is where it all starts, with Perfidia initiating a dangerous dominant/submissive relationship with Col. Steven J. Lockjaw (Sean Penn), and Pat (Leonardo DiCaprio) impressing her with his fireworks display.

The blood of battle runs hot, and so does the passion between Perfidia and Pat. A baby girl is born, the next generation to carry the revolutionary flame. But before the light can even be passed, it’s extinguished when Lockjaw seizes the upper hand and picks off the group’s members one by one. Pat is renamed to Bob Ferguson, taking the baby (now named Willa) on the run to the backwoods of Baktan Cross. Fifteen quiet years go by, with Bob and Willa (Chase Infiniti) living a secluded life for reasons she doesn’t totally understand. Lockjaw’s mission eventually gets unpaused, with his pursuit of these two fugitives plunging the town into a hotbed of  political turmoil.

One Battle After Another is the outlier in Anderson’s filmography. It’s his first film in over twenty years to take place in the present day (assumedly, since a specific date isn’t given here). It’s also his costliest production by a wide margin, with a reported budget between $130 and $175 million. Anderson fully embraces both of those facts, reminding us why the artist responsible for Boogie Nights, There Will Be Blood, and The Master deserves to have a canvas just as expensive as Jurassic World: Rebirth. Catch me on a good day, and I’ll proclaim Magnolia to be the greatest film ever made. This is a frantic story for a frantic time, furiously rushing from one location to the next. Like Magnolia, Anderson just keeps pushing us along, never allowing for a moment for wrist watches to be checked. 161 minutes fly by, all of it subsumed by Jonny Greenwood’s score that might as well have been recorded as the piano was falling down the stairs.

For all its serious earnestness, this is also a deeply silly and funny story. Lockjaw may as well be a description of the character rather than a surname. Penn walks around with the same mobility as a sunglass carousel, full of pent-up anger and jealousy. He’s the reason the Grindr Dating App always reports a massive increase in traffic at major Republican events. He desperately wants to be a member of the Christmas Adventurers Club, a group of wealthy white men who declare themselves superior solely because they deem it so. It’s easy to laugh at this ludicrousness, but we all know there probably is such a thing in our world. DiCaprio is also wonderfully buffoonish as a retired activist who can no longer remember secret passwords and see himself within the big picture.

It might seem crass to talk about award prospects so soon after the film’s debut and so far from this year’s Academy Awards. But like Oppenheimer, a movie of this size and relevance doesn’t come around all that often, and that rarity needs to be celebrated. Anderson is one of the biggest losers in Oscar history, going 0-11 over a span of nearly thirty years. The time is now for a revolution within his film, and so it is for him to walk up that gilded stage, receiving one honor after another.