In theory, there should be absolutely no reason why I should dislike this gorgeously shot poem by Terrence Malick, well, except for all the reasons I'm going to list below. Spinning a spider's web thin plot about something that has to do with a family and DDT while forgoing substantial familial interaction for the images of a flock of starlings taking flight over a scenic downtown vista or a hand sensuously stroking the rough surface of a rock; it's all very lovely but ultimately has the depth of a three hour commercial for some pop starlet's perfume or the newest shade of latex interior paint. The cast acts their little hearts out plaintively, whispering a script that could very well have been jotted down on several cocktail napkins and sounding suspiciously similar to drugstore greeting card sentiments while opera plays on the soundtrack and artfully filmed scenes of shadowplay on stucco occurs. Who are these people, and why should I care? The Tree Of Life has a Kubrick-y NatGeo feel; like it's an overlong video travel brochure for people who want to visit volcanoes, doorways in the desert, San Francisco, or the surface of the Sun. There's tons of very earnest and important film-making; with stunt butterflies, dinosaurs, closeups of soap bubbles, Pottery Barn-esque set design and art direction, and lots and lots and lots of symbolic vaginas. Someone is definitely going to win a well deserved Academy Award for cinematography, so watch it with the sound down. I watched it on DVD from the Redbox because there still isn't crap to watch on Netflix. Here's a trailer:
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