last weekend friends of mine who lived in downtown houston asked me to come along to watch margin call (2011) at river oaks theater located right in the middle of the city. they didn't tell me that the cinema is the oldest cinema in houston, and that it has only 3 screens. by the time we got there, tickets were sold out for all movies (which were only 3). one of them then suggested that we go back to his place to watch the tree of life (2011), him being new to high brow art movies, recommended by his boss, and thinks he couldn't make it watching the thing alone.
before i say anything further, let me just iterate that in general i like terrence malick films. they are not conventional, lots of people find them too dreamy, slide-showy - i've heard worse - the p-word. pretentious.
whenever i watched malick's films, the word that comes to my mind is beautiful. the cinematography, the moods, the colours, the fact that it seems to drift in no particular direction often puts in me in awe. but that's me. i am impressed that he doesn't have the need to tell the story like so many other directors might have done, it is like he doesn't care what people think about the film, because his role as a director is to put the story out there as he sees it. it doesn't matter to him if you get it or not. that's just how he sees things.
which of course, makes my two guy friends who love block buster action franchise squirmed in their seat in confusion and impatience. but they made it through the whole 2 hours and 20 minutes, relieved that they finally watched "an art film".
i don't know if it is an art film. it is a terrence malick film and there is only one terrence malick which makes it singular on its own. in a nutshell, the story is about a middle class family in texas, the stern patriarch played by brad pitt and his angel-like wife starring jessica chastain trying to raise 3 boys in the midst of surburban monotony, economic down turns, parental discord and teenage growing pains. the story is told through the eyes of jack, the oldest of the 3 boys and i feel it is imperative that while watching the movie, audience need to assume his point of view to appreciate the movie. i can't be the person watching it from the inside, i need to be in the movie along with jack and it takes me back to my childhood. i can relate to the lazy days, my disciplinarian and moody father, my soothing and full of love mother, and their fights which scared the hell out of me. the movie invokes those memories - and i guess it can't be done without intimately recording the seemingly useless details of those times. i was a child and didn't know what life will be, which i think fits the movie ostensible lack of plot. it is also expansive in its tribute to the mystery of life - right from the big bang through the dinosaur sequence and to the human fetus, wondering at the question why are we here? jack marvelled at the difficult question, as i did, back then.
this film is not for everyone and many critics praised it for being brave (while failing at the same time) because hardly anyone these days apart from terrence malick and the great dead directors like stanley kubrick and andrei tarkovsky make films like this anymore. nobody seems to wonder about the continous flow of life, endless and has no beginning. the film is not perfect, but it is good that someone out there is praying to this grand monument we call life.
