PHOTO COURTESY WARNER BROS. PICTURES

I found myself reminded of a few films while watching “One Battle After Another,” and all of those pictures are absolute classics. There are strong echoes of “No Country for Old Men” and hints of “Goodfellas.” At times, director Paul Thomas Anderson recalls his own masterpiece, “There Will Be Blood.”

Time will tell if this film, an epic journey through sun-bleached violence and conspiratorial absurdity, rises to the reputation of those points of reference. Undoubtedly, though, “One Battle After Another” is more than the sum of its considerable parts; it is a blend of humor, drama, action, social commentary and character study that adds up to convey something elemental about the contemporary American psyche.

It’s also entertaining as hell — a quality that doesn’t always accompany movies with such complex themes.

I’m reluctant to say anything about the plot. The film’s trailer, which I found intriguing, is a bit of misdirection; if you think you know what “One Battle After Another” is going to be about, you’re mistaken. The setting is the 21st century in the American West, the subject matter is a collision of guerilla activism and personal intrigue and the tone is, in a word, exasperated.

Beyond that, I’d go in as cold as possible.

Leonardo DiCaprio is our protagonist, leaning at once into his comic side (it’s rare that he decides to be self-effacing, but it’s usually effective) and his unmatched expressiveness. Sean Penn is his foil, similarly unafraid to look ridiculous, frightening only in how callously he wields power. A perfectly assembled supporting cast includes Regina Hall, Benicio del Toro, Teyana Taylor, Chase Infiniti and Tony Goldwyn.

The script, also by Anderson and based on the Thomas Pynchon novel “Vineland,” is perhaps a bit overstuffed. It’s not quite the longest film by the director — the 189 minutes of “Magnolia” probably have that record sewn up for quite some time — but it trades some degree of impact for a prolonged, epic structure.

That aside, though, it’s a memorable and perhaps significant film. I wonder if we will one day be able to observe the rise of a new type of western in the ’20s; it’s already an observable microgenre, with exemplars such as “Love Lies Bleeding” and “The Harder They Fall.” The era of principled outlaws and corrupt lawmen may well have returned.

My Rating: 9/10

“One Battle After Another” is now playing in theaters.