It polarized audiences at Cannes and has divided critics since it’s release, now Terrence Malick’s The Tree of Life has finally arrived on our shores to no less a divisive reception, but this was always going to be the case.
It polarized audiences at Cannes and has divided critics since it’s release, now Terrence Malick’s The Tree of Life has finally arrived on our shores to no less a divisive reception, but this was always going to be the case. A film of unbridled daring and breath taking ambition, the sheer magnitude of what the film tries to achieve is both spectacular and quite possibly doomed to be out of reach even for a writer/ director of Malick’s talent.
Covering the origins of the world, ruminating on difficult existential questions, and all the while exploring one family’s joys and grief, life and death through the memories of the eldest son Jack (Sean Penn), The Tree of Life was always going to suffer a little from its own over reaching. But this is a back handed compliment, for it is only when film makers dare to aim high and go where others fear to tread that the most exciting films are made- even if they aren’t entirely successful in their execution.
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The film is certainly overly ambitious, and it is true that there is a great deal of footage that could easily be cut out to make the film more digestible, but there is a great deal more to like here than not. Stunning cinematography coupled with unparalleled use of the motion of cinema, The Tree of Life is an entirely new cinematic experience.
Constantly working to suture and unsuture his audience, Malick has created a thinking man’s film that manages to revel in new experiences, showing us the world through fledgling eyes all the while drawing us closer to a level of enlightenment that remains just out of our mortal reach.
It would have been easy for such a film to approach its subject matter with clinical sterility but The Tree of Life is an entirely human picture, fallible with palpable emotion and all the more likeable for it. This is in no small part due to standout performances from Brad Pitt as the affectionate but abusive father Mr O’Brien, and Hunter McCracken as the young Jack O’Brien, a youth on the cusp of adulthood, confused by the inconsistencies between what he thinks should be and reality that life is not so black and white.
For all its many charms The Tree of Life is not going to be to everyone’s liking. See it if you like your cinema ground breaking and challenging, best avoided if you aren’t in the mood for a difficult watch.
By Haley Beatson, 17 July 2011.
For ticketing information and session times in your region visit http://www.nzff.co.nz/
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