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The Tree of Life (2010)

Director: Terrence Malick

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From Time Out London

There’s so much brilliance at work in ‘The Tree of Life’, the new film from ‘Badlands’ and ‘Days of Heaven’ director Terrence Malick, and its ambition and willingness to lay itself open to interpretation are hard to fault. But it’s also hard not to conclude that this hugely anticipated, epic movie from the lesser-spotted, 67-year-old poet of American cinema is a work that stretches itself so broadly by asking Big Questions that it ends up dealing in platitudes.

Still, ‘The Tree of Life’, which won the Palme d’Or at Cannes back in May, offers breathtaking imagery and even manages to survive an epic detour to the dawn of time, featuring the Big Bang, dinosaurs, meteors and all. It’s so ambitious and full of inquiring ideas and questions about our place in the world that, perhaps inevitably, it feels like a grand folly – albeit a heartfelt and stimulating one. Such is the chaos of life, the universe and everything, maybe that’s the only appropriate outcome of such a project?

Here, Malick takes his interests in man’s essential nature to a more universal plane. You could say the film is set in the 1950s as it portrays, in fragmentary detail, the life of a ’50s family: a mother (Jessica Chastain), father (Brad Pitt) and three young sons, one of whom they lose as a teenager. Early on, the mother’s voiceover sets up a debate, asking whether man should follow the more selfish way of nature or the less selfish way of grace, and she and her husband embody both approaches. She is a loving presence, photographed among trees, birds and butterflies; he is a businessman, prone to anger, who tells his sons, ‘If you want to succeed, you can’t be too good.’

Time is fluid even in this chapter: it’s more poetic than real. But then the film takes an extraordinary leap. We go back millions of years in time, to the beginning of the world and a long section, complete with choral music, that stands as a staggeringly crafted hymn to creation. We see swirling gases, planets emerging and the beginning of life itself, which leads to plants, fish and dinosaurs. It suggests we should see the family of the rest of the film as an archetype, a typical family in Biblical terms even, and maybe not even of any particular time.

And yet, instead of looking back from the family to the context of pre-history, you could also look back to them from now and see their story as an origin tale for modern America. Malick prompts such a view by later showing one of the sons, played by Sean Penn, in the present day – in a vague business context in a modern city but also in more dreamlike scenes, wandering in the desert. In the film’s heavenly final scene, he gathers on a beach with a crowd of characters, including his own family as they were in the 1950s. It is then that the film will tip into an uncomfortable place for some. It feels overtly religious and even Christian (rather than just interested in the spiritual) as the sound of ‘Amen’ wails repeatedly from the soundtrack.

If ‘The Tree of Life’ sounds like a swirl of images and ideas, suggestions and juxtapositions, that’s exactly what it is. Taken alone, the film’s imagery should give great pleasure to Malick’s fans and newcomers alike. Leaving aside the novelty of the magically rendered pre-history scenes, the 1950s episodes look gorgeous. The elemental, crisp photography, making even suburbia look like a place close to nature, is incredibly alluring.

And yet for all the grand ideas and the sweep of history at its core, the film comes to feel repetitive and even simplistic. It’s not so crude as to portray Pitt’s character as demonic or evil, but its portrayal of Chastain’s character as an angel of the Earth begins to feel shallow, and the ritual loss of innocence that the sons go through also feels laboured. While it fascinates as much as it frustrates, the film’s saving grace is that it always feels honest and never cynical. It seems both relevant to us and personal to the filmmaker. It doesn’t always communicate well, and when it does, it can be trite, but it’s a film that’s incredibly beautiful and wide open for the taking.

Author: Dave Calhoun

Time Out London Issue 2133: July 7 - 13, 2011

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User reviews of this film

tris said...

Posted on Mar 19 2012 18:18 Richard Bach wrote '' .... The only people who can understand us are the ones who already know what we want to tell them, and then the best of our writing can merely remind, can simply whisper 'I know that, too.

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Harry Webb said...

Posted on Mar 10 2012 03:11 Yeah, Mark, it's only a freaking film. And the Mona Lisa was only a freaking yard or so of canvas and oil, and the Nutcracker Suite a mere bucket of freaking sounds. Contributions like yours keep art right up there under the light of scrutiny and judement. We're indebted to you, cobber.

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Terry said...

Posted on Mar 10 2012 02:59 Its a beautiful move in a time were there is little, If you like symbolism and respect art. This move will take your breath away. Its one of those movies that divides the watchers with no middle ground you either love its brilliance or hate it because you don't understand it. I recommend watching it of your own volition.

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Decor1 said...

Posted on Mar 10 2012 02:11 Horrible film! Misses the 30 minute rule, In the 1st 30 minutes a film must: 1. Engage the viewer to like or dislike the characters, 2. I must be intrigrided by the narrative and want to see more. 3. I must want to see how these characters interact and resolve this narrative. 4. I must be engaged with the narrative to have questions I want answers. 5.I must want to care about these characters and their story and how they come to a a consclusion. Not one of these criteria were met in the 1st 30 minutes.. If these criteria are not met in 30 minutes the film is not going to get any better! Walk out, or better still run out, and ask for your money back. This is coming from someone who is a film school graduate, and this mandate has never failed me. And I am never wrong about a film if I apply this criteria! All good directors know they have 30 minutes to engage you! Call them on it if they do not follow through!!!

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mark said...

Posted on Feb 27 2012 11:15 too many angry comments from people who need to take a chill pill and calmly whisper to themselves its only a freaking film...eh, Harry?

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harry webb said...

Posted on Feb 27 2012 10:58 Nominations are wishful thinking. There's been too much of that going on here already. Let's stick with reality.

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tris said...

Posted on Feb 27 2012 10:53 Great to know that Brad Pitt was nominated for an Oscar, Harry, He portrayed the patronising father excellently.

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Marty said...

Posted on Feb 27 2012 09:03 Gorgeous film to look at.
Fine, nuanced acting at times.
The most deathly dull piece of cinema ever released.

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Harry Webb said...

Posted on Feb 25 2012 04:47 Tris (one post below) is telling me I'm not as mature or as sophisticated as he, she or it (tris). Frankly, I'd rather hear about what's so good about the film rather than a cheap put-down of a total stranger. The upshot of this blog so far is that Malick brings out the patronisers amongst us. If I were to join their ranks, I'd say that there are people who see a film like this and think wow, he's making all the right noises and showing all the trendy images, this must be art.
'C-R-A-P' does not spell art. And endorsement by patronisers of fellow critics doesn't make for critical assessment of a work of crap, er art, in this case. The 'nays' certainly have it on this blog, and their judgment is: Malick, get back to your drawing board and be careful where you put your hands.

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Anka said...

Posted on Feb 25 2012 03:32 One thing I learned from this movie: Malik has ego bigger than Mount Everest. Too bad, because if he got rid of all the pseudophilosophical stuff, the National Geographic stock footage, the ridiculous music and the kitchy sequence at the end, he would end up with a decent movie.

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tris said...

Posted on Feb 06 2012 10:53 Much safer, I guess. Though, life begins at the end of your comfor zone ...

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Harry Webb said...

Posted on Feb 06 2012 09:58 It's time I got my violin out, and the spew bucket.

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tris said...

Posted on Feb 06 2012 09:42 The body language, the small nuanses acted out by the characters are so true to life. The small, nearly understated body movement from Brad Pritt when he learned about his son's death was so so real and painful, but you would only have recognised that gesture of pain if you have been through the school of life. The very feminine, soft and sometimes misty figure of the mother is, according to studies, exactly the image that boys have from their mothers when they enter this world - images they prefer to keep intact.

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Suley said...

Posted on Feb 06 2012 02:14 Its a beautiful move in a time were there is little, If you like symbolism and respect art. This move will take your breath away. Its one of those movies that divides the watchers with no middle ground you either love its brilliance or hate it because you don't understand it. I recommend watching it of your own volition.

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Suley said...

Posted on Feb 06 2012 02:04 Its like a personal journey through life that's contrasted against the universe and brought together by the world

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