The Tree of Life

There is simply nothing like it out there: profound, idiosyncratic, complex, sincere and magical; a confirmation that cinema can aspire to art. more

This film is undoubtedly a piece of art, as much so as a Picasso painting, one that invites viewers to immerse themselves, scratch their heads and consider it. more

The Tree of Life is a religious experience. Overtly. Audaciously. Unashamedly. No film has ever reached as high toward the face of God and, in our commodified future, few are likely to try. more

Still, somehow, The Tree of Life - impressionistic, revelatory, elliptical - works. more

At times trying and perplexing, but it also contains some of the most psychologically insightful and ecstatic filmmaking imaginable. more

The only other film I've seen with this boldness of vision is Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey," and it lacked Malick's fierce evocation of human feeling. more

A sense of reconciliation is Malick's great accomplishment in The Tree of Life, affording us equal wonder at grace and nature alike.  more

The film is gorgeous and abstract, leaping around in time and space, structured in movements and more like a symphony than a conventional narrative. more

A shape-shifting film, it resembles a poem. At other moments, it is closer to a symphony. Most often, it approximates a fervent prayer. more

With disarming sincerity and daunting formal sophistication The Tree of Life ponders some of the hardest and most persistent questions, the kind that leave adults speechless when children ask them. more

Jessica Chastain is just a glorious, Snow White, angel. There's no question that the images are beautiful. The metaphor of the images is beautiful, if a bit over the top. Perhaps the grand Baraka -esque sequences juxtaposed with the pseudo-realistic narrative makes for TOO EPIC of a movie, if there can be such a thing. I was too overwhelmed by the former and too underwhelmed by the latter that I didn't have an emotional response. The story of a middle-aged man reflecting on his childhood, torn between the rigid yet hypocritical masculinity of his father and the warm yet all too forgiving... more

Terrence Malick's The Tree Of Life is simply an astounding picture. It redefines everything you expect a movie to be in terms of narrative, storytelling, and plot. This is a film told through the emotional states of a suburban family in the 1950s. It follows one child as he comes to understand the world through his parents. The film suggests that there are two main outlooks to life: nature and grace. Nature is to be selfish, to blame others for your shortcomings, to think of your own pleasure and your own goodwill. Grace is to accept the life that has been given to you and do your best to... more

Yes, I wasn't bowled over by this. Visually it's a feast but I can't say I was especially moved by it, emotionally or spiritually. If you compare The Tree of Life to its most obvious point of reference, Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey , whether or not the effect is illusory - which is, in itself, a moot point - at least Kubrick leaves us with the impression that we've just witnessed something extraordinary, and that further investigation will yield even richer rewards. By contrast, Malick's film somehow manages to be enigmatic without ever being particularly intriguing; I might be... more

Creation and destruction; life and death; good and evil. Everything. The Tree of Life is a Terrence Malick film - with a style of quiet musing, sensuality, and filled with a sense of grandeur and awe of its own surroundings. Like the films of the director that have come prior, it is beautiful and caressing, swaying towards feeling, tone, and insight. At its heart though lies a classic conflict of strength and will to succeed versus the due course of the world, or - as the film states - nature vs grace. But above that, it is about much more. This is ambition of the highest regard, with... more

Awe-striking visuals and an emotionally compelling story, all is superb in this magnificent spectacle of grandeur that confronts the pain of mankind with the sheer majesty of the universe. A mesmerizing piece of art where supplications of suffering echo into a ballet of images that attempt to evoke the true essence of the Divine. more

I have often wondered over the years if Malick is the laziest some ourselves. 'The Tree of Life' perfectly encapsulates all this like no other film I can think of. In the closing moments things begin to unravel and the film begins to lose its way somewhat. I could have done without Penn, as the middle-aged Jack, on an immense beach and surrounded by what? Ghosts? Memories? Somnambulant extras?? Things teeter into mawkish navel-gazing. It was as if no-one knew how to end things (apart from the end of the everything of course). But, up until this final misstep, 'The Tree of Life' really is... more