What the Film Sets Out to Be
When the promo dropped, the buzz was unmistakable: a 160‑minute genre mash‑up featuring a radical French‑style terrorist cell, a hardened military officer, and a dash of dark humor. Director Anderson billed the project as a high‑octane look at extremism wrapped in a satirical family drama. The idea of mixing an action‑filled rebellion storyline with a black‑comedy edge and a tender daddy‑daughter thread was bold, and the casting of Teyana Taylor as the militant leader Perfidia Beverly Hills alongside Sean Penn’s Colonel Steven Lockjaw seemed to promise gritty intensity and quirky charm.
From the opening credits, the film’s ambition is clear. A kinetic prologue immerses viewers in the French 75’s world—hashtag slogans flash on screen, bombings are choreographed like set‑pieces, and the group’s ideology is presented with a vaguely ironic tone. The music thunders, the camera sweeps, and the script tries to plant seeds for three very different emotional arcs.
Why It Falls Apart
The biggest problem is that the film never decides which of its three identities it wants to be. When Perfidia appears, the camera follows her with reverence, highlighting her unwavering dedication to the cause. Yet moments later the script slides into slapstick, turning a violent raid into a surreal tableau of misplaced affection between her and Lockjaw. The resulting psychosexual infatuation should have felt like a twisted commentary, but instead it reads as a tonal wobble that leaves the audience guessing whether to laugh or cringe.
Teyana Taylor delivers a performance that is both fierce and confusing. She exudes confidence, but the screenplay gives her only fragmented glimpses of motivation. Audiences are told she’s a revolutionary, then briefly shown a tender exchange with a hidden child figure—only to have the scene evaporate in the next explosive shootout. The lack of continuity robs her of a coherent emotional core.
Sean Penn’s Colonel Lockjaw, billed as one of the year’s most ridiculous characters, suffers the same fate. He alternates between grim military swagger and an almost cartoonish obsession with Perfidia. The director’s love‑hate attitude toward his own creation shows; at times we see Lockjaw as a villain worthy of a showdown, and moments later as a bewildered lover in a bad romantic comedy.
The pacing, while relentless, amplifies the chaos. Anderson’s editing hops from one high‑energy set piece to the next without giving viewers a chance to breathe. The result is a narrative that feels like a sprint rather than a marathon—except the marathon runs for nearly three hours, leaving us exhausted but unsatisfied.
Character development takes a back seat to spectacle. Aside from Perfidia and Lockjaw, the supporting cast is reduced to caricatures: a tech‑savvy hacker who only ever says “hashtag,” a bank teller who is never more than a prop, and a mysterious child who appears to justify the “daddy‑daughter drama” label but never gets a proper storyline. This thinness makes the film’s attempts at serious commentary on domestic terrorism feel shallow.
Even the film’s visual style can’t mask its structural flaws. The cinematography is slick—handheld shots during raids, neon‑lit close‑ups during the black‑comedy moments—yet the visual cohesion collapses when the tone shifts abruptly. The audience is left wondering whether the next scene will be a gritty confrontation or a satirical gag.
Critics have noted that the movie maintains high energy throughout, but energy alone cannot sustain a film that tries to juggle such disparate genres. The chaotic storytelling—jumping from bombings to intimate dialogue without clear bridges—prevents any meaningful thematic resonance. Instead of provoking thought about radical ideologies or the absurdity of war, the film drowns its messages in a sea of mismatched jokes and action set‑pieces.
In short, One Battle After Another is a case study in over‑ambition. It aims to be an incisive political thriller, a darkly funny satire, and a heartfelt family piece all at once, but the execution lands somewhere in the middle, where nothing truly works. The extended runtime feels like an endurance test rather than a rewarding experience, and viewers may leave the theater more confused than entertained.
