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The Tree of Life

The 21st Century’s 100 greatest films (BBC)

The Tree of Life

2011

Terrence Malick

Brad Pitt, Jessica Chastain, Hunter McCracken, Sean Penn ...

5.9

52,111

Drama 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 (Hunter McCracken, played as an adult by Sean Penn) finds himself a lost soul in the modern world, seeking answers to the origins and meaning ... [+]

	Author	Review
United States	Todd McCarthy The Hollywood Reporter	"A unique film (...) a beauteous creation that ponders the imponderables, asks the questions that religious and thoughtful people have posed for millennia and provokes expansive philosophical musings along with intense personal introspection."	POS
United Kingdom	Peter Bradshaw The Guardian	"Prehistoric and cosmic visions aside, Terrence Malick's film is an unashamedly epic reflection on love and loss. (...) Rating: ★★★★★ (out of five)"	POS
United States	A. O. Scott The New York Times	"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"	POS
United States	Justin Chang Variety	"Even by [Malick's] standards, "The Tree of Life" represents something extraordinary. (...) his simplest yet most challenging work, (...) Result is pure-grade art cinema."	POS
United Kingdom	Ian Nathan Empire	"There is simply nothing like it out there: profound, idiosyncratic, complex, sincere and magical; a confirmation that cinema can aspire to art. (...) Rating: ★★★★★ (out of five)"	POS
United States	Rex Reed The New York Observer	"[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"	NEG
United States	rogerebert.com	"A film of vast ambition and deep humility, attempting no less than to encompass all of existence and view it through the prism of a few infinitesimal lives (...) Rating: ★★★★ (out of 4)"	POS

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