What If ‘One Battle After Another’ Glorified Right-Wing Terrorists?

Here’s a timely thought experiment.

What if director Paul Thomas Anderson dropped a far-Right movie into this year’s awards season mix?

The project, dubbed “One Battle After Another,” features alt-Right radicals battling it out with government officials during a Democrat administration.

The protesters ignite incendiary devices around a center where January 6 defendants are being held in solitary confinement, even those who merely entered the Capitol during the “insurrection.” A few milled around outside the building that day, never joining the riot.

J6 prisoner @JohnStrandUSA describes the 4 months of “hellish” solitary confinement our govt put him in: “It was so dark and the window was so slim I couldn’t see daylight…I couldn’t see these people, but the inmates were savage, like animals, screaming, yelling constantly.” pic.twitter.com/dV4yvtpoeS

— Glenn Beck (@glennbeck) January 12, 2025

Some radicals in the film detonate bombs in government buildings, unsure if any people are still inside. They don’t seem to care.

One radical kills a security officer in a heated moment, helping several J6 activists escape in the process. She’s a heroic figure, sultry and uncompromising in her beliefs. A triumphant image of her firing a machine gun while very pregnant causes a stir.

Her beta male beau (Leonardo DiCaprio) can only hope to keep up with her revolutionary pluck.

By all accounts, the couple and their colleagues represent the film’s complicated but unabashed heroes. If they ever regret their murderous ways, it isn’t captured on screen.

Anderson’s visceral filmmaking has never been better. Sean Penn delivers a blistering turn as a Democrat-appointed colonel who will stop at nothing to capture DiCaprio’s on-screen daughter.

The storytelling is intense. The performances are all above reproach. It’s alternately scary, humorous and ripped from today’s headlines. Oh, and the film relentlessly paints Democratic officials as racist, hateful and, often, murderous in nature.

Would that film’s Rotten Tomatoes score stand at 96 percent “fresh?” What if its release coincided with real-world violence that eerily reflected the film’s messaging?

Doubtful, at best.

Yet this exact premise has the real “One Battle After Another” hitting the RT bullseye.

Critics are fawning over the film, suggesting the Best Picture race unofficially ended with its debut. Trade publications like Variety and The Hollywood Reporter are cranking out stories about the movie, pushing its awareness factor as far as it will go.

Variety cries that the film could “rule the cultural conversation,” giving the term “wish-casting” an extreme close-up.

Why wouldn’t this alternate reality film earn similar praise to the real thing? Aren’t film critics supposed to judge a film on its merits, not any political ideology?

This critic gave “One Battle After Another” a qualified recommendation, dubbing it morally repugnant but impressively assembled.

The real “One Battle After Another” is a serious film that deserves serious consideration. It shouldn’t be punished or canceled due to its incendiary nature or proximity to real-world violence.

Free speech demands we let the film get a fair public hearing, which by all accounts is happening right now. Whether Anderson’s film is responsible storytelling, given the tenor of the times, is a debate for another time.

But let’s not kid ourselves. The film’s fawning reception comes with extreme caveats, and the story’s hard-Left posturing explains exactly why.