Oscar, 'One Battle After Another' is one of the masterpieces of the century

The basis of One Battle After Another is the novel 'Vineland' by Thomas Pynchon (an author from whom Anderson had already made the remarkable 'Shape Shift'), a rather obvious inspiration, even if the film then takes narratively different paths, while remaining very faithful to the spirit of a writer who is very complicated to bring to the big screen and for whom one senses that the director feels a real veneration.

At the centre of the plot is Bob Ferguson, a former revolutionary belonging to the political group French 75, who raised his 16-year-old daughter Willa completely alone.

When the French 75's historic enemy, Colonel Steven J. Lockjaw, reappears in their lives, Bob Ferguson launches into a desperate quest to find his daughter and try to save himself at the same time.

Shot on film, the film is a true audio-visual experience, with a very high pace throughout its entire duration (around 160 minutes), enhanced by extremely precise cinematography and the thumping music of Jonny Greenwoord, the brilliant composer and member of Radiohead, whose constant sound carpet contributes to the involvement that the film offers from the first to the last sequence.

"Vineland" was published in 1990, but Pynchon had not by chance chosen to set it in 1984, the year of President Reagan's re-election. From the basis of that text, Anderson constructs an adaptation that speaks of today's America, of racism, of the horror generated by power and of that toxic white supremacism that is one of the central themes of the whole operation.

The profound political side of One Battle After Another (which also won Oscars for Best Editing, Best Casting and Best Supporting Actor, which went to Sean Penn) nevertheless finds a perfect balance with the very strong entertainment that the film manages to provide, thanks also to extremely amusing sequences set in a paranoid and grotesque atmosphere, as often seems to be our present.

For all these reasons, it is not only the film of the year, but the work of art we have been waiting for a long time, capable of representing with such power and depth the period we are living in. The Oscar will help it remain even more in the annals, even though, as we said at the beginning and as we have written since its theatrical release, there was perhaps no need for it: One Battle After Another is one of the masterpieces of our century, a new milestone in the history of cinema of all times.