There will be a pipeline

(A new category of blog entry -- the Baltocentric review, in which a work of mass culture is reviewed from a myopically local perspective bordering on delusion of reference.)

The most politically salient movie currently featuring the Baltics may not be Singing Revolution, after all, but rather another film of a high artistic calibre, There Will Be Blood.

It's supposedly based on an Upton Sinclair book, but don't let the dun California landscapes fool you -- it's a thinly disguised version of the current Nord Stream scenario.

Day-Lewis is Putin, a Stalinist (note the moustache) cipher of a man who uses a young boy (Medvedev, of course) to appear palatable to the rest of the world and expedite his acquisitions. His partner/nemesis is a chubby-faced confidence man who is looking for a kickback (Schroeder) and has a twin brother/doppelganger who is a preacher (is director Anderson saying even the Christian Democrats can be co-opted?).

Standing in the way of the pipeline is Bandy (note that even the first two letters of his name are the same as "Baltic Sea state"!) who wasn't initially consulted for his opinion.

The film can be scoured for hidden meanings -- Bandy lives to be 99, Putin ends up smashing in Germany's head with a bowling pin, etc -- and indeed hidden meanings are the only explanation for the bizarre ending.

So what if the allegory doesn't quite work? Do any metaphors stick perfectly? What's interesting that a major American prodigy is so locked into current events in this small corner of the world. There will be a pipeline...unless we heed Anderson's warning.

There Will be Blood also features a splendid acting performance by Daniel Day-Lewis.