The Real Battle of 'One Battle After Another'

A first viewing of Paul Thomas Anderson’s “One Battle After Another” mainly sets up the pleasure of seeing it again. The movie, which runs two hours and forty-one minutes, is stuffed with fast-moving, complicated action and intricate dialogue, and the editing intercuts quickly among its teeming array of places, events, and characters. The first time I saw it, I found myself struggling to keep up with what was going on—but that feeling of being behind was intensified by a lack of psychological grasp, a sense that the characters were being put into motion because the script called for it rather than because of any dramatic logic or internal urgency.