The Tree of Life film, which is now showing in cinemas nation-wide, is well worth watching. An ambitious project, containing surrealist and experimental elements, it attempts to tell the story of the universe in two and a half hours!
An American drama written and directed by Terrence Malick and starring Sean Penn, Brad Pitt and Jessica Chastain, The Tree of Life chronicles the origins and meaning of life by way of a middle-aged man’s childhood memories of his family living in 1950s Texas, while also featuring themes and imagery of space and the birth of life on earth. It explores man’s relationship with God, his kinship with his environment and his capacity for compassion and violence.
After decades in development, and missed 2009 and 2010 release dates, the film premiered in competition at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival, where it won the Palme d’Or.
“Aggressively impressionistic and unapologetically spiritual, Malick’s long-gestating meditation on the meaning of life is, if nothing else, a singularly original and deeply personal film,” says Box Office magazine reviewer, Wade Major.