OCTOBER 24, 2025 | ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT | By Abigail Hill
When “One Battle After Another,” directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, hit theaters on Sept. 26, it was met with instant critical responses. The film was described by NPR as “a prescient, mesmerizing, frequently hilarious and fearlessly political piece of work.”
This dystopian action thriller explores a United States where the presidential administration (eerily similar to the current administration) gets everything it wants. The greater society has devolved into a dog-eat-dog world where sanctuary towns and Hispanic-owned businesses are subject to frequent raids and civic rights are limited. White supremacist military men call the shots and chaos reigns.
In this world, a group called the French 75 chooses to fight back. They raid immigration facilities, plant bombs in the offices of politicians to decry abortion laws and take stands in bank robberies against “the Man.”
“One Battle After Another” follows a washed-up former member of the French 75 named Bob Ferguson (Leonardo DiCaprio), whose revolutionary lover, Perfidia Beverly (Teyana Taylor), has been exiled, leaving him with a young daughter whom he dysfunctionally raises amidst paranoia of being caught by the feds.
While the website awards show authorities like Gold Derby claim that the film will win Best Picture, it has garnered heavy criticism from conservatives who say that One Battle After Another glorifies political violence. According to The Hollywood Reporter, right-wing ideologue Ben Shapiro was quoted as saying that the film is “an apologia for radical left-wing terrorism.” At the same time, conservative-minded news outlet the National Review wrote that “It’s a macabre coincidence that One Battle After Another opens so soon after the assassination of peaceable conservative debater Charlie Kirk.”
While there is a true theme of revolution that courses through this film, the radical leftist French 75 are not the ones whom the audience is expected to look up to and honor. Instead, the character of Sergio St. Carlos (Benicio del Toro) stands out as a true example of a counterattacker to political injustice.
Sergio is a local karate teacher in the town of Bakton Cross, where Bob and his daughter have been hiding. Everyone knows him, and in the moment of crisis where the military police show up and start cracking down on local Hispanic-owned businesses in search of “drug cartels,” he is the one who picks up the phone and gets to work.
He hides the immigrants in the secret tunnels the community has developed, ensures each community member knows their role, and is a foundational member who holds it all together — caring for his family, supporting local business owners, and rescuing Bob time and time again.
While the movie’s grim warning sign of where we as a society could be heading is sometimes a bit in your face, Anderson avoids clichés by focusing on the story of people rather than politicized trigger points. He begins with the revolutionaries, yet shows that there is a futility in their protests against the corrupt government. The “Battle” has been going on for over 20 years and their violent acts seem to have brought no change. As a self-medicated recluse from society, Bob functions as an invitation to engage in hopelessness that one can make a difference.
And then we see characters like Sergio. Those who have not accepted the new normal, but are still prioritizing family, investing in the next generation, and when it matters, standing up to the government. Sergio isn’t out there for his own personal benefit; he will never go down in history as a great revolutionary, but there lies his allure. He acts out of love for his community, to which he has dedicated himself.
He willingly endangers his life for the people he knows, not for big picture political controversies and flames of glory. Obviously, Sergio cares about immigrant rights and civil liberties, but instead of fighting every battle, he chooses the ones he can win, for the ones he loves.
In a world of performative acts of justice where social expectations are to post angrily on the internet amidst the comfort of your own home, are you willing to love those around you and pursue justice for the ones in your own community who are encountering persecution and removal of civil liberties? For us to pursue a society where the tides are changed for the better, we can’t just know the ‘issue,’ we must choose to know our neighbors.