1. H.W. is not Plainview's son, he's the son of a colleague we see killed on the job in the first ten minutes of the film. Plainview unofficially adopts H.W.
And although Plainview uses the boy to further his own business interests by promoting his image as a family man running a family business, he clearly has genuine affection for H.W.
2. Plainview is already an oilman by the time Paul Sunday shows up.
3. Plainview 'abandons H.W. on a train' only in a manner of speaking. It would be more accurate to say that he sends H.W., accompanied by an employee, away to boarding school, presumably for the deaf.
4. No motives? We are given plenty of hints as to what drives Plainview, and the film is much stronger for not stating his motives overtly. The best thing about the film, for me, is how clearly it illustrates, like Citizen Kane, the link between personal history and its shaping of personality, and how these things then shape businesses, churches, a community, the wider region and finally the national economy, while never being too didactic.
After the setup, the film becomes, more than anything else, another of Anderson's explorations of fractured father and son relationships (Hard Eight, Boogie Nights, Magnolia). When critics review films like this, it seems that they are comfortable explaining the obvious and fairly academic socio-political allegories, but avoid any analysis of the real emotional core of the film.
Factual Corrections (with minor spoilers):
1. H.W. is not Plainview's son, he's the son of a colleague we see killed on the job in the first ten minutes of the film. Plainview unofficially adopts H.W.
And although Plainview uses the boy to further his own business interests by promoting his image as a family man running a family business, he clearly has genuine affection for H.W.
2. Plainview is already an oilman by the time Paul Sunday shows up.
3. Plainview 'abandons H.W. on a train' only in a manner of speaking. It would be more accurate to say that he sends H.W., accompanied by an employee, away to boarding school, presumably for the deaf.
4. No motives? We are given plenty of hints as to what drives Plainview, and the film is much stronger for not stating his motives overtly. The best thing about the film, for me, is how clearly it illustrates, like Citizen Kane, the link between personal history and its shaping of personality, and how these things then shape businesses, churches, a community, the wider region and finally the national economy, while never being too didactic.
After the setup, the film becomes, more than anything else, another of Anderson's explorations of fractured father and son relationships (Hard Eight, Boogie Nights, Magnolia). When critics review films like this, it seems that they are comfortable explaining the obvious and fairly academic socio-political allegories, but avoid any analysis of the real emotional core of the film.