SPOILER ALERT

Seriously, do not read further if you don't want the movie spoiled. You've been warned.

Here are my thoughts to kick this off. Today I'm a different audience goer than I was when I was first introduced to Malick's films. I remember seeing Thin Red Line in the theaters and thinking, yeah it's good but I like Saving Private Ryan more. Mainly because TRL didn't have much of a traditional 3 Act plot. Back then I also hated pretentious movies. Today I still dislike them, but not as much. I do dislike them when I feel the filmmaker is trying to outsmart me, or worse purposely trying to confuse me hoping I'll think the film is smart if I don't understand it.

This isn't the case with Malick. His films always seem genuine. As for Tree of Life, the critiques have been incredibly harsh and the one word used to describe it over and over is pretentious. In Cannes, where he won the Palme d'Or, the film was apparently met with both boos and cheers. Some have even eviscerated it for being preachy and overtly Christian. The title itself is a reference to the tree in the Garden of Eden found in both Genesis and Revelations.

I think we've become too cynical towards Christianity and religion in general. It's easy to politicize it and dismiss a very important mythology that can stand opposite of science. His reference to the tree of life, in my opinion, is a reference to creation and destruction. To beginning and ending. It's a metaphor for individual life as it is blinked into existence and then blinked right back out again. A transcendental metaphor that's smartly weaved in Malick's film. And it's not meant to preach the gospel of the bible, but to educate us on the mythology surrounding life and death.

He starts with a quote from Job that's essentially the part after god has tested Job and taken everything from him, and he speaks to Job directly after Job questions him, and god says (paraphrasing here) where were you when I created everything. In other words, Job asks "why me" or more specifically to the film "why didn't you intervene", and Job tried his entire life to make his existence what he wanted it to be, which for him was that of a pious one devoted to god. Then god smites him for no good reason outside of a game he plays with satan. When Job asks why, god answers by rhetorically questioning why Job didn't intervene when he was building the universe. It's not that he's asking why Job didn't help, but the futility of asking why things happen, as if there's no reason to it. As if life exists with loss and gains, and you have to affirm it as such. There is no why.

That's a great way to look at the film. The first hour or so takes us through a familial setup where we see a young boy's family in the 60s and his modern family today, both of which are experiencing suffering and loss, and both are questioning why, and then we see from god's perspective the size and wonder of the chaotic universe (and presumedly its creation) juxtaposed with the individual suffering of this one family. A dangerous universe. We see how all life has suffered through history (specifically focusing on the dinosaurs in the film at one point). It's all incidental. It's all without reason. It just happens, and we must affirm life this way.

Later in the film it focuses more on the 1960s family, and specifically from the perspective of one of the sons. His mother (Jessica Chastain) coddles him and his brothers while his father (Brad Pitt) is a phlegmatic and hard-nosed authoritarian that keeps his emotional distance - both the embodiment of being affected by passion and fear and emotion. At one point one of the sons dies. The boy we experience the movie through is always questioning why. He asks his mom why she couldn't save his brother. After a life of living under his father's violent authority, he asks why his father doesn't just kill him or kick him out. He suffers and then he questions why he's suffering, and then there's moments where he questions his own choices why he doesn't do things to ease that suffering - for instance at one point he considers dropping the car on his father who is working underneath it (effectively wiping out of existence one source of his suffering).

At one point in the film I felt as if Malick gave us a sneak peak at his intention for the film's message. At one point someone says something to effect of, "We should be good to everyone we come into contact with." This is the salient point. We can't control the suffering. We can't control the despair. Life comes with loss and bad things happen. We have to affirm it as such and make our moments as happy as possible, and also make the moments of other people's (and creatures') lives as happy as possible because they're experiencing the same kinds of suffering that you and me are experiencing. They, too, are incidental.

Malick truly demonstrates this point, I think, when he shows the boys strapping a frog to a rocket and sending it up into the sky. They added to the suffering of that creature even though they themselves are suffering. They didn't touch that creatures life in a way that enriched it, they only added to its suffering - and there was no justice, no penance. Their actions were considered incidental. At most they could be punished by their parents, but nothing intervened to stop them. Their actions were allowed to happen. In the end, I think that's the point of the movie. That we should remind ourselves that we have precious few moments on this earth, and instead of questioning why and giving into bad emotional cues (fear and anger) and acting out on those bad impulses, we should enjoy those few moments and ensure that we make them for those around us (animal and human alike) good as well. It's the classic path to enlightenment that surrounds the story of the Fall (Garden of Eden) where in order to get back into the Garden we must all transcend fear and desire. We must affirm life with suffering.

Anyhow, that's my two cents. Use it to buy a stick of gum.

>> ^Sarzy:

ARRRRGH, it doesn't open in Toronto until the 10th. Stupid Canada!


I don't want to give anything away, but Rosebud is the sled.

>> ^Ryjkyj:

I'm thinking about it. Was it good? I've gotten mixed reviews so far.


Yes, it's now one of my favorite Malick films; if not my favorite.

Your video, Trailer for Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

Also recommend Badlands (1973) and Days of Heaven (1978).

Terrence Malick is among my top ten favorite filmmakers... along with Fellini, Bergman, Scorcese, Lynch, von Triers, and others...

this one looks good -- strange casting, tho, to put Pitt in the role of the father.. maybe it's because the audience already knows him as a sort of "young stud," and not the paternal type...

>> ^Sarzy:

I, too, get a Fountain vibe (which is one of the most underrated movies of the last decade).
And I haven't seen the Thin Red Line yet, a mistake I shall soon rectify. But man, this is such a great trailer. I think I've watched it around five times this afternoon, and it's still blowing me away. promote

Tags for this video have been changed from 'The Tree of Life, Terrence Malick, Brad Pit, Sean Penn, awesome' to 'The Tree of Life, Terrence Malick, Brad Pitt, Sean Penn, awesome' - edited by RhesusMonk

Sarzy: ever in the vanguard with all news cinematic. Well done, sir. Malick is more accessible than Kubrick while retaining all the contemplation and measured pacing. Thin Red Line is a fucking masterpiece.

You're a really smart guy and from all accounts pretty darned talented, so I really don't understand this almost obsessive loathing that you have for anything that remotely resembles a group effort, i.e. collectivism. If I didn't hope to have a beer with you and "tie on one" someday I wouldn't even bother responding to your anti-collectivist, lone cowboy diatribes.

I think you're...kind of shooting yourself in the foot by ascribing a blanketed evil intent on everything that seems to involve two or more people working together to achieve a common goal.

I mean, even your movie, man. Look at your movie. You didn't do that all yourself. You couldn't have. You probably did a lot of it, and I'm not diminishing that effort, buy if it were left to you and only you to write, direct, produce, perform in, light, record, film, score, edit, and promote...you'd be working on it to this very day, and it wouldn't be nearly as good. And that kind of cooperation, that group effort for a greater good, applies to almost everything, not just movies.

And I'll make you a bet, anything that you can name, any goal, any achievement that you think you and I could do on our own, if I have one person to help me in reaching that goal, I'll get there before you. If I have ten people I'll get there even faster. And if I have a hundred, faster and greater still.

I know I'll lose some of those bets, but I'm confident that I'll win enough of them to make that loss insignificant.

Gonna watch "The Hurt Locker" tomorrow. Looking forward to it.






In reply to this comment by blankfist:
In reply to this comment by rougy:
Hmmmm. A lot to digest there, Kubrick.

Sort of neutral on J.D. Salinger. Only read Catcher in the Rye and one of his short stories, Banana Fish. I heard rumors that he and Thomas Pynchon were one in the same, and I really enjoyed Gravity's Rainbow, but I doubt the rumor was true after just now googling it.

Terrance Malick I really, really, really fucking like. I thought The Thin Red Line line was sublime. The New World, Days of Heaven, Badlands...I genuinely loved each and every one of those films. Each would deserve a post of its own for me to share my critique. The man has a gifted eye.

Gilmore Girls? Maybe I'll check it out. Doubtful. I really thought you knew me better than that, because from your description, it's not my kind of show at all. I don't really watch much television, especially series oriented shows. I only watch it now because I'm living with mamason and the thing's almost always on, or tempting me to turn it on. When I finally sell the house and get the fuck out of Roswell, I won't have a television in my home for a long, long time, not even for Netflix vids.

Few people detest...nay, despise the "corporate cog" scene more than I.

I thought you would have known that by now, too.



I was being facetious. I know you aren't the type to like Gilmore Girls, that's why I used them as an example, because they were so typical American fluff with typical pro-topical issues storylines. Entertainment Weekly and Time Magazine thought the show was fantastic. How lame is that? And they like it for its quick dialog. Really?

My point was that just because you're not pro-social doesn't mean you're wrong. There are a lot of great people who were recluses, and that is distinctively not pro-social behavior. The get along gangs need us contrarians. We like individualism over collectivism. Martin Luther King Jr didn't ask that we judge a group by the content of their character.

Hmmmm. A lot to digest there, Kubrick.

Sort of neutral on J.D. Salinger. Only read Catcher in the Rye and one of his short stories, Banana Fish. I heard rumors that he and Thomas Pynchon were one in the same, and I really enjoyed Gravity's Rainbow, but I doubt the rumor was true after just now googling it.

Terrance Malick I really, really, really fucking like. I thought The Thin Red Line line was sublime. The New World, Days of Heaven, Badlands...I genuinely loved each and every one of those films. Each would deserve a post of its own for me to share my critique. The man has a gifted eye.

Gilmore Girls? Maybe I'll check it out. Doubtful. I really thought you knew me better than that, because from your description, it's not my kind of show at all. I don't really watch much television, especially series oriented shows. I only watch it now because I'm living with mamason and the thing's almost always on, or tempting me to turn it on. When I finally sell the house and get the fuck out of Roswell, I won't have a television in my home for a long, long time, not even for Netflix vids.

Few people detest...nay, despise the "corporate cog" scene more than I.

I thought you would have known that by now, too.



In reply to this comment by blankfist:
So I take it you have a problem with recluses like J.D. Salinger and Terrence Malick?

I hear the writers of Gilmore Girls are all there to get along and do whatever the group wants. You'd probably like that show. So unoffensive and vanilla. A real non-think piece for the lowest common denominator with ample pop-culture references to make you think you're thinking. "Hey, that was a reference to Alec Baldwin's estranged relationship with his daughter! I got that because I read People Magazine! I'm well read!"

They tackle tough situations like relationship topics and social classes and whatever else the pro-social corporate censors allow them to. Being a team player means fitting in and doing your job. And that's just the sort of slave "corporate cog" message you can expect. Here's your minimum wage you fought so hard for ensuring only corporations could afford to pay the wage, now get back to your fluorescent lit hole and mass produce for them! And be sure to watch their 1984 approved tv shows that tell you you're right for believing what they believe. So say we all.



In reply to this comment by rougy:
"I just think that "pro-social" message was bogus and ill-conceived."

Because "anti-social" messages would have served the children so much better.

That's the camera I have. It's a decent camera (exception being the lens). I, too, was always in a rush; it seems to be the nature of this industry except for filmmakers like Terrence Malick. Shooting in LA is no picnic when you are shooting with no budget. We were always fearful of being run off by the cops for not shooting with a permit, and at one point we did get kicked out of a public park by the rangers.

Dodging them kept exterior production running at a snail's pace, and at times scenes that should've taken two hours to complete turned out to be up to five hours or so, because we constantly had to hide the cameras and equipment when the rangers or police came around. And those scenes turned out to be some of the ones I dislike the most about my flick.

You'll never see my film! Bwahawhaw! No, it's still in sound mix. Has been for a long, long time. Once it's out, I still have to get it color timed and converted to progressive 24 HDCAM tape, etc. etc.

The soundtrack is by Hans Zimmer. The film is by Terrence Malick. The way you've constructed your description makes it look like Hans directed the film. No biggie.

Can Terrence Malick get any love?

Edit -- I guess I shouldn't hit and run. Here's my list, in no particular order:

1) Spielberg
2) Scorcese
3) Hitchcock
4) Terrence Malick
5) Robert Redford