It was hard not to notice the awkwardness last week, as the principal creators of the anticipated oil epic “There Will Be Blood” faced members of the New York City press for the first time and returned one esoteric question after another with an array of pregnant pauses. If ever there was a case of filmmakers who would have preferred to let the work to speak for itself, then the “Blood” back-and-forth at the Waldorf-Astoria was it.

Then again, who could blame them? During the span of only 19 hours, Paul Thomas Anderson’s period drama (which, despite months of buzz, still must wait eight days before making its public premiere) had gone from “that movie with the violent title” to Oscar front-runner, cleaning house at the Los Angeles Film Critics Association’s annual vote with awards for best picture, director (Mr. Anderson), actor (Daniel Day-Lewis), and production design. Just 12 hours before, it had been showered with similar accolades by the New York Film Critics Circle. It was clear that people on both sides of the table — a surprised cast and a teeming press corps — were still trying to swallow it all.

In place of the stereotypical questions about working relationships and co-stars, things skewed more to the lofty and cerebral:

• Given that the movie, about an early oil prospector looking to turn a profit in the new West, is based in large part on the Upton Sinclair novel “Oil!,” is it a commentary on the evolution of the consumption age and a world overcome by its single-minded dependency on oil? Mr. Anderson: “If we indulged in all that — it’s a slippery slope, when you start thinking about something other than just a good battle between two guys. It would be horrible to make a political film.”

• Was there a deeper meaning to the unlikely arc of the movie’s central hero-villain, played by Mr. Lewis? Or rather, his relative lack of arc, which begins with blind rage and unchecked greed and ends in nearly the exact same place? Mr. Day-Lewis: “I never really saw him as a miserable prick. Just a fellow trying to make a living.”

• What about the title, then? Surely there must be a story behind that ominous decision — in moving away from “Oil!” and toward something as cryptic and explicit as “There Will Be Blood?” Mr. Anderson: “We changed the title because, at the end of the day, there’s not enough of the book left to feel like it’s a proper adaptation. I wrote the title down and it looked really good.”

As they shot down one fastball after another, the ambiguity of the movie’s director and leading star were matched perhaps only by that of the movie they created. “There Will Be Blood” has already split the critical community down the center, unlike any other title this year. In Los Angeles, some critics have hailed it as one of the great modern movie experiences, deserving of a place in the pantheons of the medium’s greatest achievements. In New York, meanwhile, rumors have spread of a screening at the Walter Reade Theater so disastrous that it was riddled with jeers and mocking laughter.

Next week, general audiences will begin weighing in on the 160-minute period piece that pits a meticulous oil speculator (Mr. Day-Lewis) against an equally manipulative preacher (Paul Dano) in turn-of-the-century California. Both men use the powerful weapons of their era (religion, oil, money) to wage a physical, psychological, and spiritual battle for domination over this 100-mile undeveloped swath of land.

Call it being coy, humble, or maybe even naïve, but Messrs. Anderson and Day-Lewis seem genuinely surprised by the gushing accolades and the minute analysis the film has invited. While some pointed to Mr. Day-Lewis’s virtuoso performance as the work’s highlight — simultaneously establishing oilman Daniel Plainview as a tender-hearted father to his only son, a shrewd salesman willing to stab anyone in the back, and a cold-blooded killer who spends an entire night digging a grave for one of his victims — the actor himself said he saw the man less as an emotional train wreck than as a methodical moneymaker.

In fact, when one observer noted Plainview’s turbulent — some would say callous and cruel — relationship with his child (Dillion Freasier), Mr. Day-Lewis came to the oilman’s defense. “There’s a real connection between the two,” he said. “The problem with Plainview is that he has no idea what the responsibilities of a parent really are, so his son is preternaturally responsible in the way a genuine partner would be for the day-to-day running of his business.” So is Plainview a monster, a confused father, a heartless pig? This is the debate, the riddle that stands at the center of the film. It’s why Mr. Anderson was committed to securing the exceptionally talented Mr. Day-Lewis and chose to excise the more general themes of Sinclair’s novel — those of Hollywood, the Russian revolution, Washington’s Teapot Dome scandal — and cut through to a story of two men, greed, and power.

“Upton Sinclair started writing in the ’20s,” Mr. Anderson said, detailing the unusual way that “Oil!” came about as a novel. Sinclair’s wife owned land near Long Beach, Calif., an area that became a popular location for oil drilling, and he saw firsthand what happened when the community united in its hopes of selling out big to an oil driller. “But when he witnessed this group try to get this lease together, in his words he said he witnessed ‘human greed laid bare.’ He just saw these people go absolutely crazy, and he knew what he wanted to write about, and that’s what started him on the road of that story. We just picked up where he left off, I suppose.”

As simple as the director may make this story sound, it’s in the telling — in the translation — that critics have found themselves either dazzled or dismayed. All humility aside, Messrs. Anderson and Day-Lewis better get used to it: “There Will Be Blood” is anything but ordinary, and the reactions it will elicit will be anything but common.

ssnyder@nysun.com