Not all actors cannot afford to be picky on the roles they end up playing. It is a brutal industry in which being selective. But if you see an upcoming film that features an actor like Leonardo DiCaprio, that means he really believes in the project. Teen Heartthrob’s teenage actor, who has become Oscars, boasts the filmography having worked enough with famous filmmakers such as James Cameron (“Titanic”), Christopher Nolan (“Inception”), Steven Spielberg (“Catch Me If you can”) and Sam Raimi (“The Quick and the Dead”). Working with one of these names would give you a boost of credibility, but the fact that he also favored a working relationship with the legendary Martin Scorsese in six (soon seven with “Devil in the White City”) in two decades is a real feather in his cap. And now, the next big role of DiCaprio comes to us thanks to one of our greatest work filmmakers by Paul Thomas Anderson.
Anderson’s filmography is only a masterpiece of heavy striker after the other, notably “Magnolia”, “Punch-Drunk Love” and “The Master”. It is a generational talent whose work demonstrates its almost impeccable ability to secure some of the best players in the game and capture them to perfection, to the Daniel Day-Lewis in “There will be blood” and “Phantom Thread”. It seems quite strange that Anderson did not do it Already Worked with DiCaprio before, since they seem to be a natural adjustment. Nevertheless, it is quite exciting that these two artists finally collaborate with “One Battle after the other”.
In the planned anti-crime thriller, DiCaprio plays Bob Ferguson, a burnt revolutionary figure that ends up falling back into his old habits when her teenage daughter Willa (Chase Infiniti) finds herself wrapped in a terrible situation. Warner Bros. Perhaps does not seem to have an idea of how to market this film to an occasional cinematographic audience, but for my money, DiCaprio working alongside Regina Hall and Benicio Del Toro in a PTA photo says that everything I need to know about the opening evening. Although it certainly resembles a gift for Anderson and DiCaprio working together at that time, their talents could have collided much earlier.
Leonardo DiCaprio wants him to have been in the nights of Boogie by Paul Thomas Anderson
In an interview Esquire in 2025, Anderson asked DiCaprio if he had persistent regrets, to which the actor “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” had only one – without saying yes to the main role in “Boogie Nights:”
“I will say it even if you are here: my greatest regret is not to do ‘Boogie nights. It was a deep film of my generation. I can’t imagine anyone but Mark [Wahlberg] in her. When I was finally able to see this film, I just thought it was a masterpiece. It is ironic that you are the person asking this question, but it is true. “”
On the commentary on the DVD for “Boogie Nights”, Anderson explains how the decision to drop the dropout of the school has become the porn star strongly endowed with Dirk Diggler to a decision between Dicaprio and Mark Wahlberg after being impressed by their work in “The Basketball Diaries” of 1995 (via the schools of the cinema). DiCaprio is such a committed actor that he would probably have given great performance alongside Philip Seymour Hoffman, Julianne Moore, and an Alfred Molina stage thief, but Wahlberg adapts to diggler like a glove, with the role playing his forces as an actor. It is effortlessly transformed by an optimist seduced by the prosperity of fame into a veteran of the industry trapped in a ladle cycle which chews, spits and welcomes him as a changed person.
At the end of the 90s, Anderson and DiCaprio were both notable 20 years which made large oscillations which finally sent them to the trajectory of career paths they currently have, although in different roles in the film industry. There is an irony so that Anderson believed that DiCaprio had no regret to decide to work with Cameron instead, only for him to reveal the opposite at the top of their interview. I supposed that it is better late than never correcting a couple of almost three decades in preparation.
“Boogie Nights” is currently streaming on Paramount +.
