Some thoughts on One Battle After Another

Rick Ayers

Platypus Review 183 | February 2026

One Battle After Another, dir. Paul Thomas Anderson (Sherman Oaks: Ghoulardi Film Company, 2025).

THERE HAVE BEEN DOZENS of excellent and insightful reviews of One Battle After Another, Paul Thomas Anderson’s magnificent project in response to this political and cultural moment. As a Weather Underground veteran, I suppose if I could add anything useful it would be to provide perspective on the history of extra-legal, anti-capitalist resistance groups, which is what Thomas Pynchon was thinking about in Vineland (1990), the novel that animated some of the core of this film.^[1]

Certainly, I caution my old comrades to avoid the error many political activists make when they engage with art, which is to demand that the piece be a literal representation of exactly what happened or even what might have happened. It is a movie, friends, and it’s got to move. Artists take license with the facts, but when successful they capture a more precise truth than a simple historical narrative might. Their task is to represent a feeling, an atmosphere, a context (whether of menace or exultation) of the times.

By this test, One Battle After Another succeeds remarkably. Through the brilliant creation of characters, the evocative sets, the heart-pounding speed of the action, editing, and music, the film expands our access to a place and time, and confronts us with moral imperatives that must be either acted upon or retreated from. Some people suggest that this is a film aimed at Donald Trump but really it is a morality play concerning the conflict between capitalist power and resistance / revolution. Whereas Pynchon depicts the radicalism of the 60s and 70s from the standpoint of its afterlife under Reagan, Anderson’s film moves between the 2000s and the present — but it pretty much tells an American story for any time. As Harry Belafonte has argued, the responsibility of artists is enormous: to engage in crucial cultural struggles in an arena that is not easily repressed (though they will try).^[2]

Of course, the actions of the film’s urban guerrilla group the French 75 are much more dramatic (and fun!) than anything we were able to pull off. But the feelings for commitment, comradery, and fugitive life are on point. There is something about adhering to the legally allowed, protesting under constant infiltration and assault from the government, that can be demoralizing and debilitating for a movement. Inevitably, in the late 60s, as resistance activists were being regularly jailed and leaders (mostly of color) were outright killed by the government, a sector of the movement decided to break away, to resist indictments, and to tear the veil of respectability — to go underground. The Weather Underground Organization (WUO) was one of the most visible of these groups, but there were many. During a year like 1970, when the WUO carried out a dozen bombings, hundreds of others occurred, against draft boards, Reserve Officers’ Training Corps buildings, corporate centers, and elsewhere.

Some decisions the filmmakers made were perfect — and One Battle After Another would have suffered without them. One was the inclusion of the huge demonstration against the military / ICE raids. This was important to move the focus beyond the narrow “cops and robbers” binary. All these fights exist within the context of the mass movement. And the WUO never saw itself as simply an isolated military formation. We carried out property destruction but we never kidded ourselves that we were going toe to toe militarily with the U.S. empire. We were engaged in what Ho Chi Minh described as “armed propaganda”^[3] — not an isolated foco in the mountains (as Régis Debray wrongly characterized Fidel’s guerrillas^[4]) but a force able to hit the enemy in a way that encouraged the resistance of the broader movement.

The film also captures the challenges that such radical commitment creates. Particularly affecting is the relationship between Bob (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his daughter Willa (Chase Infiniti). However extreme the radical actions of his past, however fuzzy his stoned presence, Bob is a devoted and caring father whom we recognize — just as we see what a powerful and deep young woman Willa has grown up to be.

It pushed me to think back on some of the big dilemmas we faced and still face. For example: in our youth, we throw down hard, push all the chips to the middle of the table, and imagine we might well die but decide that the struggle for justice is worth it, might even demand it. We also experience love, deep love that makes another demand: commitment to life and to the next generation. So we have kids. As time goes on, the questions become: did we do right by these kids? Was it fair to thrust them into danger and risk? Will they understand that we had to fight, especially for them and for future generations? There is no easy answer. Should one pull back and lead a respectable middle-class life that doesn’t rock the boat? What good would that do, for anyone? This was an issue young people wrestled with during the revolutionary 70s. It was a very real challenge I faced in discussions with my compañera when we were underground in the 70s, in relation to our daughters. We would debate, we would agree, we would disagree. But the ethical imperative to act, in light of the need for care, is complicated. As James Forman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) said in 1968, “And you ain’t got no business having any children if you ain’t gonna fight for their freedom.”^[5] During One Battle After Another, I was having all the feels on that question.

These are also the questions faced by my brother Bill, Bernardine Dohrn, David Gilbert, and Kathy Boudin. Zayd Dohrn explored these challenges in the podcast Mother Country Radicals.^[6] People have always had children, always brought in the next generation, even those who were fleeing the U.S. cavalry invaders and those besieged in Stalingrad. Nevertheless, I never rationalized the question so easily that I was fully comfortable with our choices. It was a deep contradiction and all one can do is dive into it, live it, knowing there is no resolution beyond the actual working out of lives.

The film manages to show how revolutionary action is sexy and also how it is ugly. The activists are not cardboard, one-dimensional characters. Each approaches the revolutionary work differently: the pirate radio guy “Billy Goat” (Paul Grimstad), the Jewish radical “Mae West” (Alana Haim), the black leader Laredo (Wood Harris) — they all have distinct personalities. And the “freedom high” of Perfidia Beverly Hills (Teyana Taylor) versus the solid workmanship approach of Deandra (Regina Hall) is deeply relatable; these are personalities that can be found in any guerrilla column. But still, each of these fighters, even though they are imperfect, enters the fight with a pure heart. They want people to be free.

The deep characterization of Willa was another important choice. In many such stories, she might have been set up as a victim, as passive and in need of protection, or simply quiet. But Willa has agency, she really fights for herself, saves herself. And, after all is said and done, she is taking off from the home with Bob to join an anti-ICE action in Oakland. That’s just the next battle after the other ones.

I should add here that I find myself a bit mystified at the way the WUO and the Black Liberation Army (BLA) have grown in significance over the decades. At the time, the WUO was a pretty small phenomenon, a brash and defiant group of young people determined to live beyond the range of the eyes of the state and to strike some direct blows against the empire. As the organization faded away (in 77, 80, or 81, depending on how you count it), the urban guerrilla resistance seemed to be over. But a number of cultural moments — Sam Green and Bill Siegel’s documentary The Weather Underground (2002),^[7] Obama’s run for president in 2008, during which he was charged with “palling around with terrorists,”^[8] Mother Country Radicals — have seemed to reanimate the meaning of the WUO and keep it in the cultural and political debates.

Why is this? Partly, it is a new generation’s romanticization of the underground life. After all, our life was not all running from the FBI and planting bombs. There were meals to cook, jobs to go to, and broken-down cars to repair. Perhaps the WUO stays alive in the imagination of the public, or at least the Left, because people are longing for a rejection of imperialism that is more thorough and powerful than centrist Democrats can offer. There was plenty that we accomplished, significant acts of sabotage (such as the U.S. Air Force’s computer nerve center in the Pentagon) as well as many smaller ones, often in response to atrocities (including annual attacks on companies complicit in the overthrow of Salvador Allende, on the anniversary of the 1973 coup in Chile). But looking back to assess our contribution, I think the most significant thing we did was not so much the actions as it was not getting caught. It was being a fugitive organization, living with false identities and clandestine communication networks, in touch with “above ground” activists and supporters, for years. We maintained an underground network that also took in (sometimes “babysat”) other people on the run — Catholic resisters, army deserters, wanted fugitives — which definitely freaked out the repressive forces and encouraged the resistance.

Some of the idiots on the Right have grumbled that One Battle After Another is a deeply anti-fascist film. And indeed it is. I guess the complainers are not just idiots; they are fascists. The film exposes not only state-military repression but also shady, secret, non-governmental, fascist enforcers sponsored by the billionaires. They are very real today and are extremely focused on white racial “purity.” At the same time, they are puerile and ridiculous (“Hail, St. Nick!”).

It was cool to imagine that the filmmakers looked at different aspects of the WUO and the BLA in their world-building. Certainly quotes and moments have been inspired by these historical markers. Many other details — the “dead baby” ID method, the removal of a heating-duct cover in a bathroom to place a bomb, the phone-booth phone call — are lifted from (or should I say “paying homage to”) the real history. And Bob watching The Battle of Algiers (1966) (mouthing the words even) is so on point and hilarious.

So many characters are brilliantly drawn and important. Of course, the two white guys, Leonardo DiCaprio and Sean Penn, are in the spotlight, which is unfortunate. Even though they turn in incredible performances, I’m thinking, really? The white guys are still in the center? More importantly, Regina Hall, Chase Infiniti, Teyana Taylor, and Benicio del Toro (Sensei Sergio St. Carlos) should be getting all the accolades. They are so good.

Especially impressive is the nod to the deep organization of the Mexican / Central American networks, in this case under the leadership of Sensei Sergio. Of course, Bob is flailing in an ongoing panic attack while the brilliant Sensei stays calm and implements a stronger, more effective response to the attacks, with a deeper network, than the white guy ever could. This reminds us that under any circumstances, even today, with horrible ICE kidnappings and the military occupation of cities, people find a way to resist. They organize, improvise, and carry on. The chance to be reminded of that truth is the reason One Battle After Another is a worthy cultural expression for our times. |P

[1] Thomas Pynchon, Vineland (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1990).

[2] See, for example, Kelsey Bennett, “Harry Belafonte: A Powerful Voice,” FLATT (ca. 2013), <http://flattmag.com/features/harry-belafonte/>.

[3] The Vietnam Propaganda Unit of the Liberation Army, founded on December 22, 1944, was the precursor to the People’s Army of Vietnam. See “Early Days: The Development of the Viet Minh Military Machine,” Indo 1945–1954, <http://indochine54.free.fr/vm/early.html>.

[4] Régis Debray ,“Latin America: The Long March,” New Left Review I, no. 33 (Sept/Oct 1965): 27. Debray described a foco as a small guerrilla cadre which “establishes itself at the most vulnerable zone of the national territory, and then slowly spreads like an oil patch, propagating itself in concentric ripples through the peasant masses to the smaller towns, and finally to the capital.”

[5] James Forman, “Liberation Will Come from a Black Thing” (Students for a Democratic Society, ca. 1968), <https://www.marxists.org/history/erol/ncm-1/forman-1.htm>.

[6] Mother Country Radicals (Crooked Media, May 26 – November 17, 2022), <https://crooked.com/podcast-series/mother-country-radicals/>.

[7] The Weather Underground, dirs. Sam Green and Bill Siegel (The Free History Project, 2002).

[8] “Palin: Obama ‘palling Around’ With Terrorists,” Associated Press (October 5, 2008), <https://youtu.be/zQBr7JKhvI4>.