‘One Battle After Another’ Wins Best Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical at the 2026 Golden Globes

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For a category that used to be a punchline, the Best Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical race at the 2026 Golden Globes delivered something close to a mic drop. After months of being the clear frontrunner, Paul Thomas Anderson’s One Battle After Another did exactly what everyone expected it to do — it won.

And yet, even in a year stacked with buzzy contenders and late-breaking challengers, this still feels like a defining moment. Because when PTA finally brings home a Globe for a film this big, this ambitious, and this politically charged, it’s not just another trophy. This was Anderson — already one of the most respected filmmakers of the last 30 years — going IMAX, going mainstream, going full blown blockbuster (even if its box office return of $200 million didn't actually break even). But does that even matter here?

This wasn’t just another character study or a meandering mood piece. It was a nearly three-hour epic that fused political thriller, action film, dark comedy, and deeply personal family drama into one furious, hypnotic experience that Steven Spielberg called "insane", and "a concoction of things that are so bizarre and at the same time so relevant", while Jennifer Lawrence added it was "the best movie [she's] ever seen" and "the most incredible movie [she's] ever seen in [her] entire life", stating that she "can't remember a time where [she] ever had an experience like that in the cinema".

How Good Is 'One Battle After Another'?

Collider's review of the movie stated that One Battle After Another is Anderson operating at full beast mode, delivering his biggest, boldest, and most emotionally rich film yet. The review praised the movie for blending political thriller, action spectacle, dark comedy, and a deeply personal father-daughter story into one propulsive epic. Anderson’s direction was applauded for making something massive feel intimate, while still packing urgency and humor. With standout performances led by Leonardo DiCaprio and a razor-sharp script, the film was called both a defining work for its time and one of PTA’s finest achievements.

Anderson has executed an unbelievably rare feat: a big-budget studio action film that maintains his specific tone and style, with a film that feels essential to our troubled modern times. One Battle After Another is the type of film that only comes along a few times a generation, a masterfully crafted work that speaks to our present as a defining work of what it was like to live in our present era. Anderson does that with humor, tension, fear, and care, in a film that’s both one of the director's and 2025's best.

Stay tuned to Collider for more coverage of the 2026 Golden Globes.