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For someone who follows the awards season with a close, particular eye, you read the tea leaves of a cinematic year based on precedent. What have the Oscars done in their history that warrants such a prediction or outcome? Statistics are heavily scrutinized and precedents are meant to be broken under the right circumstances, as we’ve seen in recent years.

Always expecting the unexpected, I took a look at some of the longest-standing Oscar stats, expecting to be proven wrong at some future ceremony; but when it comes to the age of nominees, these records are likely never to be broken under Hollywood’s current behaviors.

The youngest lead actor nominee was 9 years old.

This record has been owned by Jackie Cooper, who was nominated for lead actor for Norman Taurog’s classic comedy “Skippy” (193o-31) at the fourth Oscar ceremony at the age of 9. This declaration of Cooper...

Stars: Brad Pitt, Jessica Chastain, Sean Penn, Hunter McCracken, Laramie Eppler, Tye Sheridan | Written and Directed by Terrence Malick

Present day, and a late-middle-aged Jack O’Brien (Sean Penn) is stalking his plush modernist house in a state of numbness. He is materially successful, but he’s still grieving for his brother, who died aged 19. We never see what happens to the brother, but our route into Jack’s childhood is a scene where his parents (Jessica Chastain and Brad Pitt) receive the tragic news. Like so much in Terrence Malick’s modern masterpiece, there are no words, just emotions etched on faces and written in the eyes.

Malick takes a brief diversion to the dawn of the universe, before charting evolution through to the arrival of mammals. The Big Bang and the birth of microbes is depicted using the same astonishing Petri dish visual effects that Douglas Trumball used in 2001: A Space Odyssey.

“Toscanini once recorded a piece [of music] sixty-five times. You know what he said when he finished?” the stern, often mean Mr. O’Brien (Brad Pitt) says to his son eldest son Jack (Hunter McCracken) in Terrence Malick’s“The Tree of Life” (2011) and once again in “The Tree Of Life (Extended Version)” (2018). “‘It could be better,’ he answers before pausing for effect, “Think about it.”

Malick, presumably modeled after Jack’s character in the film, may have been talking to a version of himself through his father played by a world-famous actor—‘Tree Of Life’ is intensely autobiographical—but he may also have been unintentionally reaffirming his own manifesto.

Continue reading Criterion’s ‘Tree Of Life’: Terrence Malick’s 3-Hour Version Expands A Vision Of Grace, Loss & Family at The Playlist.

“Tell us a story from before we can remember.”

How can you improve upon one of the greatest films of all-time? Terrence Malick’s “Extended Version” of The Tree of Life–188 minutes long and now available on The Criterion Collection–is less a radical reinvention and more a gratifying expansion, giving a deeper imprint to various threads of the original, ultimately sculpting a more affecting, fleshed-out picture of a story that remains boundlessly evocative in its ambition.

At first blush, one will notice the differences in Sean Penn’s introduction. Adding more torment to his life–including hints of extra-marital affairs and metaphoric visuals for outrunning his demons–gives additional credence for why he’d be reflecting back on the fractured memory that is his childhood, if you happen to agree with that interpretation of the film. In this section, Malick also introduces a brief but no less rousing mix...

Four decades into an already legendary career, Terrence Malick realized his most rapturous vision to date, tracing a story of childhood, wonder, and grief to the outer limits of time and space.

Reaching back to the dawn of creation, Malick sets a story of boyhood memories on a universal scale, charting the coming of age of an awestruck child (newcomer Hunter McCracken) in Texas in the 1950s, as he learns to navigate the extremes of nature and grace represented by his bitter, often tyrannical father (Brad Pitt) and his ethereal, nurturing mother (Jessica Chastain, in her breakout role...

Today, Criterion released “The Tree of Life” on DVD and Blu-Ray, a package that will include a new version of the film 49 minutes longer than the theatrical version. Director Terrence Malick opened up the edit not because he was prevented from releasing a better version of the film (New Line Cinema released his director’s cut in 2011), but because he wanted to continue that film’s creative process.

“What’s interesting talking to Terry about this [new version of ‘Tree of Life’], I think he still doesn’t want people to think this is a better version. This is another version,” Criterion technical director Lee Kline told us earlier this month. “He said, ‘No one asked Bob Dylan to play a song the same way every night. Why should I have to make one film?’”

So what’s in the new version? Here’s a summary based on having watched the two versions side-by-side.

In the new,...

Terrence Malick’s magnum opus fully expresses what might be called his ‘Unified Theory’ of cinema — which embraces the human experience from the core of family life to the creation and destruction of the universe. Even Stanley Kubrick didn’t go that far: he never filmed merciful dinosaurs or anything as simple as a mother who experiences rapture rolling in the grass with her young sons.

The Tree of Life

Blu-ray

The Criterion Collection 942

2011 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 139, 179 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date September 11, 2018 / 49.95

Starring: Jessica Chastain, Brad Pitt, Sean Penn, Hunter McCracken, Laramie Eppler, Tye Sheridan.

Cinematography: Emmanuel Lubezki

Film Editors: Hank Corwin, Jay Rabinowitz, Daniel Rezende, Billy Weber, Mark Yoshikawa

Original Music: Alexandre Desplat

Production Design by Jack Fisk

Produced by DeDe Gardner, Sarah Green, Grant Hill, Brad Pitt, Bill Pohlad

Written and Directed by Terrence Malick

I’ve wanted to review The Tree of Life ever since it came out.

It has been nearly seven — seven — years in the making. While The Tree of Life‘s theatrical release was expanding, rumor emerged that Terrence Malick had been fashioning a very long cut that “would mostly focus on the middle portion of the film where we follow Jack (Hunter McCracken) as he grows up in 1950s Texas under the guidance of Brad Pitt and Jessica Chastain’s characters.” Somewhere between five and six films later, Malick is bringing it home: Criterion’s Peter Becker revealed to Variety that a 179-minute alternate take — not a director’s cut, but “a fresh view of the film that has a different rhythm and a different balance” — is coming to home video later this year, its focus “primarily on the lives of the O’Brien family and the backstory of Jack (Sean Penn).”

Giving credence to those old rumors is the fact that Becker’s...

A new year means an opportunity to reflect on the past. This is our list of the 100 best films of the last 15 years, Part 1 #100 through 76.

The first decade and a half of the 21st century has brought a lot of changes to the landscape of film. The advancement and sophistication of computers has made realistic computer generated effects a mainstay in both big-budget and small-budget films. The internet and streaming technologies have given big Hollywood new competition in films produced independently and by non-traditional means. We went from purchasing films on yards of tape to plastic disks, and now we can simply upload them to the cloud. Advertisements for films have reached a higher, more ruthless level where generating hype through trailers and teasers is crucial for a film’s commercial success. Movie attendance has fluctuated along with the economy, but that hasn’t stopped films from breaking box office records,...

Catch a few glimpses of A.J. Edwards’ directorial debut, The Better Angels, and you could be tricked into thinking you’re watching a Terrence Malick film. As the end credits attest, Malick is the primary producer, although his name’s appearance once the film fades to black feels redundant. More intimate in scope but just as evocative and stunningly photographed as his rural-set modern classics, The Better Angels owes much of its feeling to the director’s mentor. And, that is not always a bad thing. However, one gets the feeling that the new filmmaker is more impressed with Malick than Abraham Lincoln, whose pre-pubescent life is the focus of this first feature.

The film opens in 1817 in the Indiana backwoods where a young boy explores the wilderness, paddling down the river and playing in the fields. When he sticks out his chin, it is clear from an uncanny resemblance...

So…what do I mean by “What the F**k?” Movies? These are the films that, upon completing your viewing, you seriously worry about the director’s sanity. Or you can’t really comprehend what you just saw. Or you know what you watched was something magical, but can’t really put the pieces together in your mind. Or, worse, you know what happened, but certifiably it’s insane. But with this “definition” comes a few caveats: no horror films and no fully animated films. Those genres lean a little too crazy to begin with – it’s more fun to look at films that force a sense of realism, even if it’s just on the surface.

50. Southland Tales (2007)

Directed by: Richard Kelly

Not all these movies are necessarily “good.” In 2001, writer/director Richard Kelly found cult status with the mind-bending Donnie Darko. It took six years for him to...

My first real attempt at understanding the brilliance that was Stanley Kubrick came in my freshman year of college, when I wrote a research paper on 2001: A Space Odyssey for an English class. After all that work, I only received a B and found myself more confused than ever. But there it was – the spark that Stanley Kubrick’s work produces. Kubrick’s best films were experiences; it’s impossible to “half-watch” one of his many masterpieces. And that’s what the movies on this list do. They take you on an odyssey of visual wonder, psychological tremors, and expect you to do as much work as the people involved in the making of the films. Yet, in the end, Kubrick’s films didn’t feel like homework. They felt like vacations to a world where deep thought is a welcome respite.

20. The Thin Red Line (1998)

Directed by Terrence Malick

What makes it Kubrickian?...

Just this past week, Dolan Reynolds wrote an article dissecting the ending of Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. Now, in this article, I will be confronting the ending of Terrence Malick’s The Tree of Life. While The Tree of Life is a more emotional, earth bound, and spiritual film than 2001, what unites both films is their philosophical examination of the evolution of mankind and their questioning of our place in the universe, as well as where we’re heading as a species.

2001 is considered a landmark in the history of cinema, and while The Tree of Life is still a fairly recent film, I can see it becoming a landmark in itself as time goes on. Like 2001, it pushes the boundaries of narrative cinema and lends itself to many interpretations. Which brings me to the ending of Malick’s film. As the title of this article suggests,...

While Terrence Malick's "The Tree Of Life" undoubtedly marked the start of the ascent of Jessica Chastain, it also provided a great debut for its young stars, Hunter McCracken and Tye Sheridan. While the former has yet to book any more projects, the latter has been making his way onto more films, most recently starring in another Cannes premeire, Jeff Nichols' "Mud." And Sheridan is keeping it southern, joining a movie that will have him getting in the Cage. Sheridan has joined David Gordon Green's "Joe" in a role that will find him co-starring with none other than Nicolas Cage. Welcome to Hollywood, kid. Penned by Gary Hawkins, and based on the 2003 novel by Larry Brown, the film tells the story of the unlikely bond between an ex-con (Cage) who becomes a role model to a 15 year-old (Sheridan) from a broken home, and their journey on the...

Anyone who says that actors are an afterthought in a Terrence Malick film are doing a serious injustice to the director and his work. It would be somewhat surprising to find A-listers queueing up to work with the filmmaker if he wasn't someone who worked well with his performers, and one doesn't have to think very hard to come up with memorable turns in his pictures -- Sissy Spacek in "Badlands," Richard Gere in "Days Of Heaven," Jim Caviezel in "The Thin Red Line," Q'orianka Kilcher in "The New World," Hunter McCracken in "The Tree Of Life" -- even if the landscape and imagery is just as important. So it was no surprise to learn when we sat down for roundtable interviews in Toronto earlier this week with Olga Kurylenko and Rachel McAdams, the female leads of the director's latest film "To the Wonder," that both actresses had clearly loved working with Malick.

Just to add even more to the barrage of Best you’ve certainly received already, we have another version for you. Catch my list here, if you haven’t already.

Every year around this time we get the barrage of “top ten” lists, and every year around this time I feel out of the loop. Not having the privilege of living in the vicinity of a major metropolitan area, many of the critics’ favorite films of the “year” do not actually see the light of day in my part of the country until well after the new year, leaving me to play catch up about a month or so later.

Unfortunately, this is yet again the case in 2011, subsequently seriously handicapping my own formation of any “best of” list in a timely manner. Despite this set back, the change over from one year to the next is an irresistibly retrospective wellspring,...

Author’s note: The Tree of Life has already been reviewed on Dearcinema but this is a fresh evaluation and reflective essay about its implications because it is now being hailed as the best film of the year and it is not unlikely that it will soon make it to Sight and Sound’s list of the greatest films of all time.

Terrence Malick, one of America’s most respected filmmakers, first attracted attention through Badlands (1973) a film very much in the same mold as Arthur Penn’s Bonnie and Clyde (1967) and Robert Altman’s Thieves like Us (1974) in that it is about a young couple going on a robbery spree in the depression era and eventually coming to a tragic or bad end. What distinguishes Malick’s film from the other two is the director’s lyricism, his deep sense of the beauty of the land – where Bonnie and Clyde...

With the Oscars finally concluded and cleared up for another year, with familiar lessons learned and perturbing trends set for the rest of the year, time comes for evaluation and discussion, thoughtful or otherwise. And one thing is clear: if there was predictability to be had in 2012, it came in the acting categories.

Although precious few will dispute the merits of the Dujardins, Streeps, Plummers and Spencers of the acting world, or even protest their victories, more talk comes about who didn’t win (Gary Oldman, and I will not pipe down about this), and those who weren’t even nominated (Hunter McCracken; Again, not letting it slide).

On various occasions throughout the years, an actor has given a truly outstanding performance in film, one that deserves all the plaudits and riches in the galaxy. And often, for varying circumstances, this same performer has had to settle with a simple,...

Our critics select the likely winners of Sunday night's statuettes, plus the people and films more deserving of the prizes and those who weren't even nominated – but should have been

Peter Bradshaw

Best picture

Will win: The Artist

Should win: The Artist

Shoulda been a contender: We Need To Talk About Kevin

Best director

Will win: Michel Hazanavicius (The Artist)

Should win: Michel Hazanavicius

Shoulda been a contender: Steve McQueen (Shame)

Best actor

Will win: Jean Dujardin (The Artist)

Should win: Jean Dujardin

Shoulda been a contender: Michael Fassbender (Shame)

Best supporting actor

Will win: Kenneth Branagh (My Week With Marilyn)

Should win: Kenneth Branagh

Shoulda been a contender: Bruce Greenwood (Meek's Cutoff)

Best actress

Will win: Meryl Streep (The Iron Lady)

Should win: Meryl Streep

Shoulda been a contender: Anna Paquin (Margaret)

Best supporting actress

Will win: Octavia Spencer (The Help)

Should win: Melissa McCarthy (Bridesmaids)

Shoulda been a...

No doubt: it's been a very good year for both these stars. And much as I admire Jean Dujardin's sublime performance in The Artist, my hunch is that the industry will favor one of its own on Oscar night. So who will it be -- George or Brad? I'm saving my prediction for a later Oscar piece, but for now simply want to consider these actors' respective contributions, leading up to and including 2011. And you'll note I say "actors," because one thing this past year confirmed was that both these handsome, movie-idol type personalities can, in fact, really act. Some will claim they've always known it, but for me this was a pretty striking discovery. Too often Pitt and Clooney have been constrained by their leading man status to playing cool, heroic protagonists who save the day and get the girl. And they appear to be playing themselves. (Sometimes even on the same screen,...

Laramie Eppler, Jessica Chastain, Hunter McCracken, The Tree of Life Terrence Malick's Cannes winner The Tree of Life, a "cosmic" family drama starring Brad Pitt, Jessica Chastain, and Sean Penn, topped the Online Film Critics Society's list of 2011 winners. The Tree of Life won five of its seven nominations: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Supporting Actress (Chastain), Best Editing (Hank Corwin, Jay Rabinowitz, Daniel Rezende, Billy Weber, Mark Yoshikawa), and Best Cinematography (Emmanuel Lubezki). No other film won more than one award. [Full list of Online Film Critics winners and nominees.] Malick lost the Best Original Screenplay Award to Woody Allen for the fantasy Midnight in Paris, the filmmaker's most popular movie in years. Midnight in Paris features Owen Wilson, Rachel McAdams, and Marion Cotillard. The Tree of Life's other loser, Brad Pitt, had been shortlisted in the Best Supporting Actor category. Christopher Plummer won for his performance as Ewan McGregor's gay father in Mike Mills' Beginners.

By Scott Mendelson

HollywoodNews.com:This is the third of several year-end wrap essays detailing the year in film. This time, it’s about highlighting the good or great films that slipped under the radar somehow. Some got rave reviews and wide releases but stiffed at the box office while some never made it out of limited release. All are worth tracking down and all are, with one exception I will point out, now available on DVD/Blu Ray/download/etc. And nearly all of them are not hardcore independent films, but seemingly mainstream dramas and comedies that would have likely merited a wide release even a few years ago. Once again, these will be in alphabetical order.

13 Assassins

Like pretty much all Magnolia titles in the last few years, the majority of the film’s initial profits came from their OnDemand services, with Takashi Miike’s truly epic samurai drama...

One only gets a sole opportunity to make their initial mark and it is a thoroughly remarkable experience to witness a star in the making. This year we’ve seen a number of break-out performances worthy of recognition and have rounded up our favorites. They range from an experienced thespian finding new life in front of the camera, a previous non-actor learning the ropes and an actress who overwhelms with a sheer breadth of projects. As part of our 2011 year-end features, check out the rundown below and let us know your favorites.

10. Gabriel Maille (Wetlands)

A brave and powerful oedipal drama set on a Quebec dairy farm, Wetlands and Gabriel Maille’s brilliant performance as Simon, a disturbed isolated teen, was a highlight of Tiff 2011. With only four credits to name, Maille takes center stage, holding his own against the veteran cast in a challenging roll. – John Fink

9. Jacob Wysocki...

Making lists is not my favorite occupation. They inevitably inspire only reader complaints. Not once have I ever heard from a reader that my list was just fine, and they liked it. Yet an annual Best Ten list is apparently a statutory obligation for movie critics.

My best guess is that between six and ten of these movies won't be familiar. Those are the most useful titles for you, instead of an ordering of movies you already know all about.

One recent year I committed the outrage of listing 20 movies in alphabetical order. What an uproar! Here are my top 20 films, in order of approximate preference.

1. "A Separation"

This Iranian film won't open in Chicago until Jan. 27. It won the Golden Bear at Berlin and was just named the year's best foreign film by the New York Film Critics Circle. It is specifically Iranian, but I believe the more specific...

Brad Pitt in Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life The Tree Of Life, Michael Shannon, The Interrupters: Chicago Film Critics Surprise Winners Best Picture The Artist The Descendants Drive Hugo * The Tree of Life Best Foreign Film In a Better World Incendies * A Separation The Skin I Live In Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives Best Director Michel Hazanavicius for The Artist * Terrence Malick for The Tree of Life Alexander Payne for The Descendants Nicolas Winding Refn for Drive Martin Scorsese for Hugo Best Actor George Clooney for The Descendants Jean Dujardin for The Artist Michael Fassbender for Shame Gary Oldman for Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy * Michael Shannon for Take Shelter Best Actress Kirsten Dunst for Melancholia Elizabeth Olsen for Martha Marcy May Marlene Anna Paquin for Margaret Meryl Streep for The Iron Lady * Michelle Williams for My Week with Marilyn Best Supporting Actor * Albert Brooks for...

Terrence Malick's "The Tree of Life" topped the nominations of the Chicago Film Critics Association's awards so it's just fitting that the movie led the winners, receiving 4 awards including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Supporting Actress for Jessica Chastain, and Best Cinematography for Emmanuel Lubezki's work.

The Best Actor trophy went to Michael Shannon for "Take Shelter," while Michelle Williams received the Best Actress award for "My Week with Marilyn."

Here's the complete list of nominees and highlighted winners (If you're interested to see the winners/nominations from other award-giving bodies, visit our Awards Avenue coverage right here):

Best Picture

The Artist

The Descendants

Drive

Hugo

The Tree of Life

Best Director

Michel Hazanavicius . The Artist

Terrence Malick . The Tree of Life

Alexander Payne . The Descendants

Nicolas Winding Refn . Drive

Martin Scorsese . Hugo

Best Actor

George Clooney . The Descendants

Jean Dujardin . The Artist

Michael Fassbender . Shame

Gary Oldman . Tinker,...

The Chicago Film Critics Association has announced their nominations for the 23rd Cfca Awards and Terrence Malick's "The Tree of Life" led the pack with 7 nods including Best Picture, Director, and Supporting Acting notices for Brad Pitt and Jessica Chastain.

"The Tree of Life" will duke out with "The Artist," "The Descendants," "Drive," and "Hugo" for Best Picture. Winners will be announced Dec. 19th.

Here's the full list of nominations (for your complete Awards Season guide, click here)

Best Picture

The Artist

The Descendants

Drive

Hugo

The Tree of Life

Best Director

Michel Hazanavicius . The Artist

Terrence Malick . The Tree of Life

Alexander Payne . The Descendants

Nicolas Winding Refn . Drive

Martin Scorsese . Hugo

Best Actor

George Clooney . The Descendants

Jean Dujardin . The Artist

Michael Fassbender . Shame

Gary Oldman . Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

Michael Shannon . Take Shelter

Best Actress

Kirsten Dunst . Melancholia

Elizabeth Olsen . Martha Marcy May Marlene

Anna Paquin...

Chicago – It may have had a controversial journey to the big screen, but the Chicago Film Critics Association thought that Terrence Malick’s “The Tree of Life” was worth the wait, nominating it today for a leading seven awards, including Best Picture, Supporting Actor (Brad Pitt), Supporting Actress (Jessica Chastain), Director, Original Screenplay, Cinematography, and Promising Performer (Hunter McCracken). Joining “The Tree of Life” in the race for Best Picture is “The Descendants” and “Drive,” each with six nominations total, and “The Artist” and “Hugo.” each with five.

Overall, a remarkable 43 films were chosen as some of the best of 2011, with other multiple nominees including “Martha Marcy May Marlene” with four nods, and six diverse films granted a pair of nominations — “A Separation,” “Melancholia,” “My Week With Marilyn,” “Shame,” “The Help,” and “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.”

As they often do, the Cfca made some inspired choices, including several unexpected picks.

Chicago – Yesterday, we brought you some of the most engaging and memorable supporting performances of 2011. As much as I love some of the acting work in that feature, it’s nothing compared to the talent on display below. The fact is that the Best Actor and Best Actress categories this year are arguably more crowded than ever, with an amazing number of performances that will be remembered for years to come. My runner-ups, in both categories, could have easily beaten most other years’ top five lead nominees. It actually pains me to list some of them outside this year’s top five, but we’ve had an embarrassment of riches in 2011. What an amazing year for acting.

The Best Actor Performances of 2011

There is a staggering level of variety and depth on display in this list of performances from some of the best working actors today. I loved the sheer...

W.C. Fields famously said about show-business, "Never work with children or animals." This year, a trio of films are challenging that conventional wisdom with regard to the animal kingdom ("War Horse," "We Bought a Zoo," and "The Artist," whose canine companion has inspired an unlikely awards campaign), but perhaps more surprising is how many films in this year's Oscar race are dominated by children. Fourteen-year-old Asa Butterfield plays the title role in "Hugo," an orphan who lives inside the walls of a train station in 1930s Paris. Thirteen-year-old Thomas Horn makes his film debut in "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close" as a boy searching for answers after his father is killed on 9/11. And though the existential drama "The Tree of Life" has no single focus point among its cast, Fox Searchlight's campaign materials identify young Hunter McCracken, who plays Brad Pitt and Jessica...

One of this year’s more tantalizing pieces of news has finally received a follow-up. We first reported in June that Terrence Malick‘s The Tree of Life would be getting expanded to an astounding six hours through reinstated footage, the majority of which “would mostly focus on the middle portion of the film where we follow Jack (Hunter McCracken) as he grows up in 1950s Texas under the guidance of Brad Pitt and Jessica Chastain’s characters.” When you hear that your favorite film of the year is going to be inflated by about three and a half hours, you want to hear more. And we didn’t.

Until now, at least. AllThingsShining (via ThePlaylist) spoke to Billy Weber, one of five editors credited on The Tree of Life, and he told them that Malick is indeed “doing a longer cut of ‘Tree.’” It might not be the most herculean task,...

Terrence Malick is a director who weaves a visual tapestry and that is certainly true of his latest effort. Although this effort is certainly to have people taking sides as the images may be beautiful but the narrative is not for everyone. The Tree of Life begins at the beginning of time, but pauses to contemplate the childhood of Jack O.Brien (Hunter McCracken) in Waco, Texas. Jack lives with his dad (Brad Pitt), mother (Jessica Chastain), and brothers R.L. (Laramie Eppler) and Steve (Tye Sheridan). Jack.s mother is a free spirit and nurturing where his father is strict and authoritative. We even continue our trek to Jack.s (Sean Penn) future and maybe even his afterlife. I guess I.m a bit...

What's left to say about The Tree of Life? Probably a lot, and that means something considering the number of articles Brad and I have written about it before and since its May premiere at the Cannes Film Festival. Then again, that's what I love about the movie and the primary reason I see this disc as a must-own. Are we all just tiny cogs in the giant machine of life? Or are we the center of our own small universe? The Tree of Life sees us as both. The film is at once an intensely intimate story about a young boy's conflicts with his authoritarian father (Brad Pitt) set in a small 1950s Texas town and a broad, ambitious work that explores the origins of the universe and transcends everything we expect from a film. Director Terrence Malick pushes the boundaries of the medium, while still remaining decidedly old-school...

Chicago – Terrence Malick’s “The Tree of Life” has stirred up a bit of controversy since its debut early in the Summer of 2011. You almost certainly saw the stories (or Facebook posts or tweets) about the audience walk-outs and signs at theaters that warned ticket buyers that they were about to see something unique. And you may have heard that Sean Penn has even revealed that he thought the film flawed (although most outlets took what he said out of context). Ignore the nonsense. Ignore the backlash that greets every great work of art. Experience “The Tree of Life,” recently released on a gorgeous HD Blu-ray, for yourself. And, whatever you may think of it, the film is a true “experience.”

Blu-Ray Rating: 5.0/5.0

Most movies don’t ask much of the viewer. They provide the laughs or the scares and all they want is an instinctual, knee-jerk response — laugh, jump,...

With "The Tree of Life" on DVD and Blu-ray and "Martha Marcy May Marlene" opening in limited release on Friday, it seemed a good time to take stock of the best debut performances the cinema has to offer. Hunter McCracken in the former and Elizabeth Olsen in the latter offer up award-worthy work, stunning in their capacity to inhabit their characters and seek out the truth therein. The research on this one was taxing, and I don't mind telling you, this list might be different on another day. It's tough to settle on 10 when there are so many sterling debuts...

Before we move on to our new and hopefully joyous Fall Movie Season (which begins September 13th here at Tfe) let's look back briefly on the season that was... the movies that opened from May to August. How do we look back? With lists of course.

Three Best Uses of 3D

Glee: The 3D Concert Movie - Heather Morris's boobs. ("Brittany S. Pierce" has long since surpassed "Coach Sylvester" as Glee's comedic Mvp. If only the Emmys had noticed for their season 2 specific nominations). Transformers Dark of the Moon - the top of that building cracking and tipping over... and that time that Shia Labeouf almost fell to his death. Every Movie That Opted Not To Use It.

Ten Performances That Made the Summer

Vera Farmiga and Dagmara Dominczyk all sisterly sensual with palpable chemistry in Higher Ground Andy Serkis continues to elevate mo-cap into a new acting...

We all know Sean Penn speaks his mind all too often and now he's criticizing his role in Terrence Malick's latest film The Tree of Life. Penn complains of his characters purpose in the scenes set in the present where his younger portrayer Hunter McCracken acted across Brad Pitt's as the son who had a particular dislike for his father. The New Yorker posted the dialogue from the French newspaper Le Figaro: "I didn't at all find on the screen the emotion of the script, which is the most magnificent one that I've ever read," said Penn.

While most blogs/sites post their “best of the year so far” lists in June, I like to wait until August – with good reason. You see, we here at Sound On Sight cover various film festivals across the globe. Five of the biggest fests (Sundance, SXSW, Cannes, Tribeca and Fantasia) all take place before August, while five other major fests (The New York Film Fest, Fantastic Fest, Tiff, Festival Du Nouveau Cinema, BFI London) all begin sometime in September or later. And since their are so few good films theatrically released in the first three or four months of the year, I feel like August is the best time to post this list. It gives us one more opportunity to further promote these great movies, before they are drowned out by all the major players heading our way. Before you read my list, there are a few things you should know.

Brad Pitt is superb as a grieving father in Terrence Malick's poetic essay on the nature of existence

With its invocations of the Book of Job and breathy incantations about the "way of nature and the way of grace", Terrence Malick's Palme d'Or-winning The Tree of Life begins more like a prayer than a movie. It demands hush and attention but it also craves reverence; it certainly requires calm, a work that needs to be watched, not just recollected, in tranquillity.

Its first image is a shimmering oval of light in which it is just possible to discern, for a moment, a hand, perhaps that of Jesus. It soon gives way to grass and leaves and wafting net curtains, a tumble of gorgeously tasteful images underscored by a whispered voiceover. This is trademark Malick, using all of cinema's possibilities to express the ineffable: sound, image, dialogue, music, design.

About twenty minutes into Terrence Malick’s “The Tree of Life,” there is a sequence that chronicles the creation of the universe. There is darkness, then supernovas of stellar light, volcanic eruptions, fire, and colossal swells of waves and gushing water. Once the earth as we have come to know and recognize it has taken shape, we see dinosaurs. When the first behemoth, a wounded plesiosaur, appears on screen, a woman sitting behind me in the theater said, quite loudly, “We should have gone to the movie next door.”

Mr. Malick’s creation interlude, complete with dinosaurs and single-celled amoeba blobs, has been a divisive element of his film among audience members and critics alike. This is mainly because the more conventional 1950s-era plotline (done, in typical Malick fashion, unconventionally) is so flawlessly realized. It follows the coming of age story of young Jack (Hunter McCracken), and his relationships with his mother,...

The Tree Of Life (12A)

(Terrence Malick, 2011, Us) Brad Pitt, Jessica Chastain, Hunter McCracken, Laramie Eppler, Sean Penn, Tye Sheridan. 139 mins

Successor to Kubrick's 2001 or extended perfume ad? Either way, Malick's macro/microcosmic take on life, the universe and family life makes most films look unadventurous. Beyond the head-trip "creation of the universe" sequences, it's largely Sean Penn's impressionistic reminiscence of his conflicted childhood, rendered in gorgeous imagery, with introspective voiceovers and a dreamy intensity.

The Princess Of Montpensier (15)

(Bertrand Tavernier, 2010, Fra) Mélanie Thierry, Gaspard Ulliel, Lambert Wilson. 140 mins

There's costumes and courtliness, but this 16th-century saga remains unstuffy. Sought-after Thierry's quest for self-determination is the focus, and the treatment is modern and immediate.

Trust (15)

(David Schwimmer, 2010, Us) Liana Liberato, Clive Owen, Catherine Keener. 106 mins

Those who saw Catfish will know where this teen's online relationship with an apparently nice boy is headed. But what follows is an exercise in parent-worrying technophobia.

Rating: 1.5 out of 5 stars

I missed the first press screening of The Tree of Life on Monday morning having walked from the apartment Owf are renting just off the seafront in Cannes unknowingly without my accreditation pass. Gutted, I knew it was too late to turn back, find the pass, and make it in on time and so I went back to bed in sheer despair that a movie I have waited several years for director Terrence Malick to showcase was going to go unseen by me at the first opportunity because of my own bloody absentmindedness.

Instead then I caught the mid-day second screening a few hours later which was still 100% packed to the rafters of people who like me missed the morning one. Maybe even some repeat viewers were there, who knows? The atmosphere and anticipation was still rife and I had not yet read the online reaction to the film on purpose.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Cine-lyricism is yet to have its blockbuster moment; it’s a hidden genre; the purview of artists and academics. Once, when film was young, intellectuals, like Virginia Woolf, dreamt of the photochemical frame as a new type of canvas upon which a unique and intellectual art form, fresh for the 20th century, would evolve. She thought it should express itself differently, a contrast to the literary narrative; it could be a medium that appealed directly to the intellect, providing a different sort of challenge to the established arts.

Woolf, as you might imagine, was subsequently horrified when cinema, in a cynical grab for mass audiences, instead looked to the novel for inspiration. But this, Woolf, noted, was not story telling worthy of the name; it was superficial, incomplete; the cinema, she said, must not be a parasite – it must be left to its own devices.

Woolf,...

We start the Top 7. You finish the Top 10.

Pat yourself on back, moviegoers – we’re halfway there. We’ve traversed through ugly January and February films (Big Momma’s: Like Father, Like Son), survived a barrage of 3D (Hop, Gnomeo and Juliet), and I personally live to tell the tale of the year’s worst movie, Beastly. Now it’s time to celebrate the triumphs of 2011, of which there are certainly a few. Some of them will even be part of the entire year’s best films. I don’t anticipate Beginners, Win Win, The Tree of Life, or even Midnight in Paris to be pushed out of Oscar-conscience any time soon.

read Jeff Bayer’s Top 7 Films So Far in 2011

Vote – What Year had the Best Movies?

7. Fast Five

Recap: Dom (Vin Diesel) and Brian (Paul Walker) get put on the top of the Feds most wanted list after...

Terrence Malick made two of the most admired films of the 1970s and the best American war movie ever. His latest work, The Tree of Life, is released next week.

How might the surviving American film-makers of the 1970s appear to someone born in the early 90s, a casual cinema-goer who consumes blockbusters at the local multiplex? Scorsese must seem the longwinded master of glossy action-thrillers, Polanski a maker of earnest European fare, Spielberg the purveyor of soured epic, and Coppola not even a name. Would such a person feel, as I once did, exhilarated about the latest Woody Allen? And Terrence Malick? If all you had to go on was The New World (2005) and his new film, The Tree of Life, would it be possible for you to understand the reverence that moviegoers feel for his work?

Badlands (1973), Days of Heaven (1978), and The Thin Red Line (1998) are masterpieces, but...

The Tree of Life Written & Directed by: Terrence Malick Starring: Brad Pitt, Sean Penn, Jessica Chastain, Hunter McCracken Terrence Malick's existentialist experiment The Tree of Life triggered walkouts, exasperated sighs, and confused chatter. I loved every minute of it, but it's easy to sympathize with an unprepared audience. Imagine it: half an hour into an otherwise grounded '50s family drama, the universe is born. Their confusion was understandable, but their rudeness was less forgivable — I had to tell two whispering women behind me to curb their incessant chatting. With the shuffle of shopping bags, they not only obliged, they left. Though not particularly fair, it's easy to defend Tree of Life and condemn their reaction in the greater context of Malick's body of work. I don't know what contingent of the crowd had had exposure to the filmmaker, or consequently arrived as preconditioned to his introspective narrative stylings as I had.

In 1931 Austrian mathematician Kurt Gödel proved what is now known as the Incompleteness Theorem. He demonstrated that within any given system, a robot for example, there would always be at least one proposition, which is true, but which cannot be proven using the rules and axioms of the system itself. Gödel used a variation of the classic Liar’s Paradox to show this. The statement, “This sentence is false,” can never be verified or falsified without a contradiction emerging, thus the inherent limitations of the system are revealed. If you think of the universe, which we are a part of, as a system, then it is by definition incomplete. In other words, unless humanity manages to do the unthinkable and transcend the black void, a complete understanding of the universe will never be within our grasp. And even then, the theorem would presumably still apply. The plight of the inquiring...

Director Terrence Malick returns with The Tree Of Life, a meditation on life and death that rewards the patient, Ryan writes…

Terrence Malick's The Tree Of Life has changed the way I look at everything. The flutter of birds' wings. Water flowing in a brook. The movement of grass on the breeze.

This is due, in part, to Malick's personal brand of visual poetry, which brings a sense of awe to even mundane things. It's also due to the film's backside punishing length. While sitting there in the dark, watching this latest box of wonders Malick has so carefully prepared, I briefly began to wonder if I'd ever see the outside world again.

This isn't to say that I didn't find myself enthralled by The Tree of Life, far from it. Nor is it actually that long. At one hundred thirty-eight minutes, it's shorter than Michael Bay's forthcoming effects jamboree,...

The Tree Of Life *****

Reviewed by Duncan Bain

Stars: Brad Pitt, Jessica Chastain, Sean Penn | Written and Directed by Terence Malick

Terence Malick is one of the few film directors working today who is still regarded as an auteur, a visual lyricist, a unique voice unbound by commercial imperative or franchise potential. His seemingly glacial rate of productivity makes the 6 year gap since his last (The New World) his shortest to date. Not many directors can boast of making 5 features over a span of 40 years and still be held in such high esteem.

This of course is a precursor to the fact that The Tree Of Life is a hugely ambitious work of cinematic art, choosing to tell the tale no less than of the birth of the universe, the history of our galaxy, Planet Earth, the birth of life, evolution, and somewhat inevitably, The End Of Time itself. No...

Tree of Life

Starring Brad Pitt, Jessica Chastain and Sean Penn

Directed by Terrence Malick

Rated PG-13

How do you even begin in describing The Tree of Life, directed by Terrence Malick? “An ambitious, if not sublime, representation of life as an everlasting cosmic entity and an important aspect of human life”, by that description I’ve already made the film seem heavy handed, but don't waver on deciding whether or not to see the film. It's beautiful, funny, terrifying and a strange depiction of a family in the 1950s. Some reviews have likened it to providing a sense of enlightenment by its meditative nature and to think that I (selfishly) wanted to let the film live on its own, without the need of contextualizing it in words.

Don’t worry, there are human actors as well in the film and to say that the performances are truthful and reminiscent...