Paul Thomas Anderson has given us Tom Cruise talking dirty in “Magnolia,” Adam Sandler hording pudding for frequent flyer miles in “Punch-Drunk Love” and Mark Wahlberg as an aspiring porn star with a massive…drug problem in “Boogie Nights.”

Now, after a five year absence from the silver screen, Anderson returns with “There Will Be Blood,” and Oscar-winning actor Daniel Day-Lewis plays the filmmaker’s darkest creation yet.

“Blood” protagonist Henry Plainview is an independent oil man who travels the country at the turn of the century searching for plots of land to mine for black gold. On a dusty tract of Central California, he discovers quite the windfall with crude practically bubbling up among the rocks. But as the film’s ominous title and the anxiety inducing soundtrack portends, the acquisition of massive wealth and awesome power brings consequences—bloody, violent consequences.

Metromix recently spoke with the director and his principals—including co-star Paul Dano (“Little Miss Sunshine”) who plays a young evangelical preacher struggling with Plainview over control of the locals—about their provocative drama just as the award season buzz around the film’s Oscar chances began to heat up.

Paul, this is the first time you’ve adapted something to the screen. What made you choose Upton Sinclair’s book “Oil!”?
Paul Thomas Anderson: I had been trying to write something and I had a story that wasn’t really working about two fighting families. But when I read the book, it had so many ready-made scenes and the great venue of the oil fields. We changed the title from the book because at the end of the day there’s not enough of it left for it to seem like a proper adaptation of the book. And probably selfishly, I wrote the title down and it looked really good.

Were you interested in oil before that?
PTA: I grew up in California and there’s a lot of oil out there. I don’t live that far from Bakersfield, which is where the original discoveries of oil in California were, and they’re still pumping today. The story of oil in California, and in this country, was really well told in the first 200 pages of Upton Sinclair’s book.

[Sinclair] witnessed this group try to get a lease together, and in his words said [it was], “human greed laid bare.” He had witnessed these people go absolutely crazy, and that set him on the road of that story. We just pick up where he left off, I suppose. At the core of the story was the drive and ambition, not only from this independent oilman but also from the people that he’s supposedly getting the better of by leasing their land—the ambition on both sides.

Daniel, did you enjoy playing such a miserable prick?
Daniel Day-Lewis: I didn’t really see him as a miserable prick. The challenge [of this role] is, I dare say, the same that it always is: to discover a life that’s not your own. And Plainview, as he came to me in Paul’s beautiful script, was a man whose life I didn’t understand at all. It was a life that was pretty mysterious to me, and that unleashed a fatal curiosity for me, which I had no choice but to pursue.

Paul, what inspired the casting of Paul Dano as the twins Eli and Paul Sunday?
PTA: The first time I had seen Paul was in “The Ballad of Jack and Rose.” I called [the director and Day-Lewis’ wife] Rebecca Miller to tell her how much I loved the film and to tell Daniel [who starred in it] how much I loved the film, and really the first question on my mind was “who the hell was that?” He was terrific.

And Mr. Dano, how did you prepare for the roles?
Paul Dano: It first started with trying to learn a little bit about the time period. I think whenever you’re doing a period piece that’s important, but especially to me sharing a lot of scenes with Daniel, knowing how well he immerses himself within the period. That was something I really wanted to pay attention to.

I looked up some stuff about evangelical preachers but I sort of had a privilege with Eli, which is that he didn’t have radio and television. He just sort of made himself up once he found what his gifts and savviness and charisma could bring him. Through the words of the Bible and loving to hear himself talk, he found some way to be spiritually seductive. I don’t know if that was an excuse on my behalf or something—but it was a way for me to just run with the material Paul gave me.

Paul, how closely did you work with Jonny Greenwood on the film’s powerful score?
PTA: It kind of begins and ends with Jonny Greenwood. He’s better known for his day job with the band Radiohead but he had written a few orchestral pieces I’d heard that I thought were terrific. I’d known him for a few years, I showed him the film and he said ‘OK, great.’ I gave him a copy of the movie and about three weeks later he came back with two hours of music. I have no idea how or when he did it, but he did it. It’s kind of amazing. I can’t say I did any real guiding or had any real contribution to it except to take what he gave us and find the right places for it.

Daniel, what can you share about shooting the gruesome final bowling alley sequence?
DDL: We shot that scene in the Doheny mansion [in Downtown Los Angeles]. Upton Sinclair loosely based the character in his book “Oil!” on [Edward L.] Doheny and the life of the Dohenys, so there was a connection there. This huge, great gloomy pile was the pyramid [Doheny] built for himself with the wealth he accumulated. It’s overseen by the Doheny trust and [they] employ a very large army of people in extremely neat uniforms to watch every move you make in the place. I don’t know what they thought we were doing in there, but they seemed quite disturbed by the whole thing.