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IT’S ALL IN <\/strong>the title. The name of Paul Thomas Anderson<\/a>‘s newest movie alone\u2014One Battle After Another\u2014invites thoughts of heart-pumping, fist-clenching action, and there’s certainly a whole lot of that in the film’s 2 hour and 42 minute runtime. But when Leonardo DiCaprio’s character Pat Calhoun (later known as Bob Valentine) declares, early on in the film, that “from this point on, it’s one battle after another” (cue the Leo meme<\/a>), he’s talking about more than just gunfights, acts of revolution, and car chases.<\/p>\n One Battle After Another is, indeed, a big-time epic thriller adventure\u2014but it’s also a story of a dad, played by DiCaprio, doing whatever he can, every day, to protect the daughter he’s been left to raise by himself. Through his revolutionary activity with the French 75, Bob built a romance with the strong, confident Perfidia St. James (Teyana Taylor)\u2014and that eventually led to a daughter being born amidst their dangerous lives. But when you’re in this world, when you believe in what you believe in and fight for what you fight for, those battles exist anywhere you look. And without much of a choice, Perfidia exits the picture. Bob is left alone\u2014in a pseudo-witness protection situation, after the French 75 were mostly captured or killed\u2014to raise a daughter named Willa.<\/p>\n