The Tree of Life movie review: tantalisingly imperfect
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The lavish style of director Terrence Malick reaches for the heavens in The Tree of Life, the kind of big budget art film that strikes fear in the hearts of popcorn guzzling punters desperate to avoid flexing any brain muscles when they venture to the cinema.
It is long, slow, humourless, stars a mainstream cast — thus making it more likely to “trick” the general public into buying a ticket — and is the vision of a veteran artiste on a high falutin’ hike to cinematically encapsulate nothing less than the entire gamut of human existence.
The poor fools who rolled in because they saw Brad Pitt’s name on the poster risk falling asleep or going postal. Actually, those who arrived compelled by the hype and hungry for an intellectually nourishing cine-meal — after all, The Tree of Life snared Canne’s top gong, the Palme d’Or and has been greeted warmly by critics — risk the same responses.
The core of the film is a story of a white picket Midwest family in the 50′s and particularly the dynamic between a strict father and his sons. Brad Pitt plays the head of the O’Briens, a stern and imposing figure whose presence causes his three boys to live in perpetual fear and uncertainty.
When Mr O’Brien (as the credits affectionately identify him) goes off to work the kids create mischief in the neighborhood while mum (Jessica Chastain) potters around the house. Prosaic stuff, for sure, but the father/sons dynamic resonate powerfully. The performances — particularly from Pitt and young’un Hunter McCracken, who evokes a thoroughly uneasy resentment for his character’s father — are bang-on.
But Malick isn’t satisfied with making a powerful and affecting kitchen sink drama. Not by a long shot. Hovering over the The Tree of Life is a misty kaleidoscope of ruminations on life, the universe and everything, replete with representations of the beginning of the world and a post-death spiritual hinterland. There are visions of Aurora Borealis explosions of colour in the sky, giant outer-space forms of light, phallic billows of clouds, saintly voices whispering sweet nothings, even a moment when we visit the dinosaurs for a brief “wazzup?”
Malick’s Kubrick-esque ambition is matched only by his hubris. Shakespeare once wrote of the A word: “by that sin fell the angels” and thus it is so with this tauntingly imperfect film, fattened by grandeur, grounded by imbalance and blaring imperfection.
Presented in stark comparison to the dramatic richness of the suburban family setting, where the characters’ stories play out with beautiful and eerie vividness, Malick’s ‘meaning of life’ cut scenes feel like they were gaffer taped onto the central narrative, broken bits from different, weirder, looser productions, the equivalent of stream of consciousness filmmaking fashioned in the spirit of high-end film school assignments — the kind of scenes that wouldn’t look out of place in a David Lynch joint.
Rather than prompting audiences to question the nature of the universe, Malick’s overreaching ruminations will more likely prompt them to wonder why they were included in the first place. There is no justifiable correlation; no tangible link. Meditative, rich, and beautifully shot, The Tree of Life is a bold and botched experiment.
The Tree of Life’s Australian theatrical release date: June 30, 2011.
see it
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Couldn’t agree with you more. Struggled to stay awake at times (though this could be a reflection on the viewer rather than the film) despite some excellent performances. The 2001/Odyssey sequences didn’t quite belong and the heart of the matter was painfully drawn out at times.
Saved me from doing a review.
PS Hope MIFF offers more this year. Any tips?
I loved the cosmic sequences most, but it felt like they were part of a different film (and apparently they will be, for IMAX). I also felt there was a really good film hiding somewhere that could have used some editing and a bit more narrative. It’s no 2001 by any stretch of the imagination as it just lacks that peculiar, chilling, dark mysteriousness it tries so hard to capture.
This is clearly not a movie for everyone. However, I missed any hubris in this journey. Rather, I think to place human dramas in the broad breadth of the universe is a confronting humility. Flawed perhaps at some points at the end, I personally found Malick’s capturing of the moments of family connectedness deeply moving.
An awful lot of evolutionary ‘space’ and pretty watery pictures disturbed by vignettes of a disturbed family.
The mysteries of evolution and the mysteries of the portrayal of the family left many unanswered ‘ black holes’ to fall asleep in. The photography was excellent, but the images were often difficult to correlate with the under developed story. Who were all the characters?
If it was meant to show the A-Z of life then why was there no procreation, unless the subtle joining of two ‘bubbles’ said it all. Sex could have shown the ‘Big Bang Theory’ and at the least given a misplaced missing awakening climax.
If you were a kid like me and got to see 2001 A Space Odyssey when it first came out. This is it’s real sequeal. Mind blowing stuff. That captures the world we live in now. Defentently not for the main stream unfortunately. OK maybe it’s more of a cross between Solaris and 2001 A Space Odyssey. Never got to see Solaris though until I was an adult. Oh! Well no space travel for my generation just some real spiffy looking cities around this old world of ours and gobal warming too.
One the one hand I want o applaud the attempt to provide a thought-provoking adult film but on the other hand there were many “Are we there yet?” moments in the very drawn-out sequences intended to illustrate some point. The best thing was the portrayal of the father/son relationship.
Saw it yesterday and was blown away by it.
It has flaws but it’s still one of the most remarkable films I’ve seen in many years.
The key to understanding it (and I say this as a non-believer) is the quote from Job at the beginning. The cosmological side shows the big picture of the universe and life – and in the short dinosaur interlude, perhaps the beginnings of consciousness, conscience and mercy. The family story is in a sense a retelling of Job – bad things happen to (generally) good people. As a voice-over says at one stage (quoting a sermon I assume) if we open ourselves up to God embracing us, we have to open ourselves up to God turning His back on us. And as the quote from Job indicates, he had bigger things on his mind than our individual lives. Hence the cosmological side – there’s an awful lot else on God’s mind, folks. But at the end (an afterlife, or the character’s wish?) all will be reconciled.
It’s a profoundly Christian film. Not Hillsong/Festival of Light/Jesus wants me for a sunbeam Christianity, but Christianity at its most profound and philosophical. The mother is the path of Grace, the father is the path of Nature. Both are, in a sense, ciphers.
The flaw to me is that the cutting between the two scales ceases for much of the family drama, which becomes somewhat one-dimensional as a result. Nevertheless it can be almost Bergman-esque in its intensity.
It is also incredibly beautiful, with some stunning camera work.
I want to see it again next week, something I’ve NEVER done with any film.
Glad you gave this don’t rush. Saw it last week. The biggest flaw for me was the characterisation. I was waiting for Brad Pitt to have a change of heart, but nup, he’s angry dad all the way through. The kids are the least memorable of any film I can recall. It is pretty tho.
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