The Tree of Life (Brad Pitt, Sean Penn) in Theatres on June 22, 2011

The Tree of Life (2011)

Audience
Rating: 3.5/5
Like the Movie: 66% (n=25,320)

Critics
Rating: 4.1/5
Like the Movie: 86% (n=165)


Reviews

"What a transcendent achievement." - Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post

"Terrence Malick's singularly deliberate style may prove unrewarding for some, but for patient viewers, Tree of Life is an emotional as well as visual treat." - rottentomatoes.com

"An audacious visual poet known for gently probing life's big questions, Malick has gone to the source of it all. He's gifted enough to bring out the spiritual dimensions of astrophysics." - Chris Vognar, Dallas Morning News

"I've seen it twice now, and though this childhood was not my childhood, and my spiritual yearnings are not Malick's, "The Tree of Life" already has come to mean a great deal to me." - Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune

"It's a flawed but impressive experiment, the sort of shoot-the-moon gamble that cinema can't do without." - Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star

"Here's a testament to this reclusive, stubborn, visionary director's stunning achievement: His films can change the way you look at the world by showing you how another person sees it." - Dana Stevens, Slate

"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." - A.O. Scott, New York Times

"[Malick is] a meticulous visionary who knows where to place a camera, but he hasn't a clue about how to tell a story with simplicity and coherence." - Rex Reed, New York Observer

"This movie weighs so much, yet contains so little. It's all vault and little coin." - Wesley Morris, Boston Globe


Movie Info

From Terrence Malick, the acclaimed director of such classic films as Badlands, Days of Heaven and The Thin Red Line, The Tree of Life is the impressionistic story of a Midwestern family in the 1950's. The film follows the life journey of the eldest son, Jack, through the innocence of childhood to his disillusioned adult years as he tries to reconcile a complicated relationship with his father (Brad Pitt). Jack (played as an adult by Sean Penn) finds himself a lost soul in the modern world, seeking answers to the origins and meaning of life while questioning the existence of faith. Through Malick's signature imagery, we see how both brute nature and spiritual grace shape not only our lives as individuals and families, but all life. -- (C) Fox Searchlight

Rated: PG-13

Running Time: 2 hr. 18 min.

Genre: Drama, Action & Adventure, Science Fiction & Fantasy

Directed By: Terrence Malick

Distributor: Fox Searchlight

Cast
Brad Pitt (Mr. O'Brien)
Sean Penn (Jack)
Jessica Chastain (Mrs. O'Brien)
Hunter McCracken (Young Jack)
Fiona Shaw (Grandmother)

Source: rottentomatoes.com