To the Wonder (Terrence Malick)

[Stay Puft]

TO THE WONDER
Director: Terrence Malick

IMDb page

[NickGlass]

Pretty much encompasses half of what Malick does best (sublime imagery and ineffable emotion, here via portrait of cultural assimilation and fading of love) and half of what he's made into self-parody (anything involving McAdams and Bardem).

[dreamdead]

Got tickets for this for next Friday. The recent Reverse Shot review excites me.

[ThePlashyBubbler]

Coming to Pittsburgh in two weeks, can't wait.

[ledfloyd]

Coming to Pittsburgh in two weeks, can't wait.

The Manor?

[ThePlashyBubbler]

The Manor?

Harris.

Upstream Color also playing Melwood Screening room 12th-15th.

[ledfloyd]

Harris.

Upstream Color also playing Melwood Screening room 12th-15th.

Nice, I don't know if I'll be able to make it down for Upstream Color, but I'll probably make the trip for To the Wonder. Even if the Harris isn't my favorite theater.

[plain]

Labuza and Glenn Heath Jr for Slant both loved it, I can't fucking wait.

[EyesWideOpen]

This is gonna be On Demand starting this friday. That's pretty cool.

[Henry Gale]

This is gonna be On Demand starting this friday. That's pretty cool.

Really? That actually frustrates me a bit. Between this, Place Beyond the Pines and Trance all opening, I might actually end up opting to watch the new Malick at home. The other two are playing fairly close to me starting this Friday, while Wonder isn't released here until a week or two later. But I'd still much rather see this on the big screen.

I've just been waiting for this long enough to jump at whatever chance I have to see it.

[Henry Gale]

Also, here's Ebert's review for this, the final one he ever wrote.

It's finally hitting me how much I'm going to miss these sorts of thoughts from him.

[ledfloyd]

yeah, i don't know if i'm going to be able to wait until next weekend.

[plain]

Never thought I'd say it, but Malick has managed to craft a film and a world entirely devoid of emotion and lyrical charge. Outside of Kurylenko, the flimsy and often impenetrable narrative trajectory never finds its ground; the likes of Affleck, Bardem, and McAdams are then deemed insignificant (it's mostly their role as ciphers) in this depiction of modern isolation and love lost. I'll still need to take another look at the film, but as of now it registers as a pretty stagnant and empty experience.

Skinny Pete though, guys.

[ledfloyd]

I'm kind of confused by people who loved previous Malick films and didn't care for this. To me, it isn't any different. Every bit as transcendent as The New World and The Tree of Life.

[Boner M]

To me, it isn't any different.

And that's the problem.

[ledfloyd]

Not to single out plain, but "devoid of emotion and lyrical charge," would seem to imply that there is something different about To the Wonder. Unless that's a descriptor you would apply to his previous films, and in that case I completely understand being unmoved by it. It's as if people are sensing a shift between TTOL and TTW that I fail to perceive.

[EyesWideOpen]

I'm kind of confused by people who loved previous Malick films and didn't care for this. To me, it isn't any different. Every bit as transcendent as The New World and The Tree of Life.

What about people who loved previous Malick films except for The Tree of Life and thought this one was pretty good?

[ledfloyd]

What about people who loved previous Malick films except for The Tree of Life and thought this one was pretty good?

Haha, you make sense to me.

[Ezee E]

And that's the problem.

Why is it a problem now, but wasn't in Tree of Life?

[Boner M]

Why is it a problem now, but wasn't in Tree of Life?

ToL may have employed the same stylistic tics, but they were taken to new extremes, and the film was a marked departure for him in scope, ambition and subject matter (aside from his broad preoccupations with nature and spirituality). There's a reason it was instantly hailed as a landmark film, while The New World wasn't.

I wrote this on TtW after seeing it at TIFF last year:

...this is the first Malick film that feels like a minor work, like ToL without scope; w/ that film's language - so perfect for expressing childhood reminiscence - here applied to the experiences of adults who, from all evidence, are overgrown children. I was totally on board with the first half or so, but from thereon I couldn't shake the sense that the reels could've been randomised to no great loss, something I've never sensed with his prior films, which all feel intuitively cohesive and even beautifully structured, for all their ellipses and fragmentation.

I guess 8:30am screening in a festival setting isn't the best place for opinion formation, but I don't have much desire to revisit this one.

[plain]

I just couldn't connect to this one, and I would agree with you in some regard, as I feel it does come across as a sort of "Malick's greatest hits" to me; don't get me wrong -- this is intended to be a wholly emotional work (his most personal and cynical one could argue), but I never felt in tune with the rhythms and tones, and really did find it quite laborious in stretches. But I do look forward to revisiting it in the next week or so.

[Ezee E]

ToL may have employed the same stylistic tics, but they were taken to new extremes, and the film was a marked departure for him in scope, ambition and subject matter (aside from his broad preoccupations with nature and spirituality). There's a reason it was instantly hailed as a landmark film, while The New World wasn't.

I wrote this on TtW after seeing it at TIFF last year:



I guess 8:30am screening in a festival setting isn't the best place for opinion formation, but I don't have much desire to revisit this one.

That makes sense. Especially with The New World's setting and the beginning/end for Tree of Life. Maybe there's a reason that Malick takes 10 years with each film he does? I'll check this out, just because you see Malick on the big screen no matter the case.

8:30 AM screenings for anything are kind of lame. And when you pile on 3-4 movies afterwards, I've always felt them all to kind of flow together.

[Watashi]

I liked it all overall.

[transmogrifier]

I don't think I'll bother.

[ledfloyd]

Some thoughts on the film: http://tongue-tiedlightning.blogspot...lick-2013.html