I’ll say this right up front: I admire Terrence Malick. The man made Badlands, for crying out loud; he made Days of Heaven. He is a director with vision and a gifted storyteller. That said, nobody hits a home run every time at bat. Malick has long been considered one of cinema’s giants, but that kind of distinction creates a mythos that is difficult, if not impossible, to live up to. He has been notorious for taking long hiatuses between films, and when those films arrive, they are often ponderous, atmospheric works relying as heavily on the camera and setting as much as the actors or dialogue.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
There are times, as in the case of Days of Heaven, when Malick’s sensibility creates something more akin to a moving portrait than a “movie.” I was reminded of Days of Heaven more than once as I watched Malick’s newest film, To the Wonder. Like the earlier film, To the Wonder features long, wordless stretches that focus more on tall grass or other such nature than on people; and, often, the scenes between actual actors involve very little talking and tend to be quite short. Both films also rely heavily on voiceover to set the tone and carry the story along. This was rather fascinating in Days of Heaven, in which young Linda told the parable-like story of her adult caretakers from a child’s perspective. In To the Wonder, we are treated to voiceover from nearly all the major players, and the shifting perspective is at times 
arresting. This is never more true than in the film’s opening fifteen minutes, in which we are introduced to the focal couple, Neil and Marina (played by Ben Affleck and Olga Kurylenko, respectively). Kurylenko’s Marina narrates the opening sequence — full of loving vignettes of a couple in the full bloom of romance — as a series of poetic statements. The images Malick pairs with these lovely words are gorgeous and perfectly attuned to the bliss and solemnity of a couple tethered to each other at the soul.
The film goes on for a bit like this: absolutely beautiful visuals and intermittent, dazzling poetry. There is little dialogue in the film, and that is both refreshing and intriguing for the viewer. We are carried from the couple’s bliss in Paris, where Neil is visiting and Marina lives, to their move to Oklahoma, where Neil lives and works, testing groundwater for contaminants caused by construction. Along for the journey is Marina’s ten-year-old daughter, Tatiana, a precocious girl reminiscent of Days of Heaven’s Linda. At first, Marina is enchanted by the wide-open spaces and middle-class charm of Oklahoma. She is lonely, the odd woman out, but she spends much of her time dancing and laughing with her little girl, happy to be in a new land with the man she loves. Eventually … not to spoil the plot … things go wrong, as they do. Very wrong.
In Oklahoma, we are introduced to another central character, Father Quintana (played by Javier Bardem), a priest who has lost his faith and spends most of his time either visiting the most hard-pressed denizens of the town or hiding from the same disadvantaged folks behind his locked door. These are interwoven storylines, the transitions between which can be jarring, but the overlapping voiceover helps to connect the characters and their shared emotional experiences.
The gist of the film, with all apologies for trying to boil down Malick, is that these characters seem unable to achieve happiness, including and especially in the fields, places, and relationships they crave most. The blissful couple cannot maintain their bliss as isolation and mistrust grow, and Father Quintana’s search for meaning in the desolation and squalor around him makes even his higher calling empty. These are characters who are alone, even when they are together, standing in the widest landscape possible under a huge open sky. They are us, and we are very small, all alone and shouting to a God that will not answer, trying to climb up to the Wonder.
Okay.
That’s the first half of the review. The half in which I admire Malick as a filmmaker and try my best to pay respect to his visual style and his bold attempt to tell a story in a fascinating, practically wordless way. The second half of this review is about my experience watching the film, and how it became the most unintentionally hilarious thing I’ve seen in a while.
I can remember watching another of Malick’s films, The Thin Red Line, and remarking after that it was like trying to watch a poem. It was lovely, but confounding; obviously the work of a great mind, but self-indulgent and, ultimately, an exercise in style. I feel much the same about To the Wonder; the main difference being that, while The Thin Red Line was like a poem, To the Wonder is like the world’s longest perfume ad. I tried to hang in there; I really did. But around the time Malick served up a scene of a turtle swimming in the ocean apropos of nothing, I gave in to my snarkier impulses and quietly MST3K’d this thing.
Some personal highlights, overheard in my own head:
- ”I like Ben Affleck when he doesn’t talk. This is some of the best not talking he’s ever done.”
- ”I’ve never seen two people have this many emotional moments standing on their lawn.”
- ”Javier Bardem is in a much better movie than the rest of the cast.”
- ”What the fuck happened to that turtle?”
- ”Honey, why did we decide to move to Purgatory, again?”
- ”Hey, wasn’t Rachel McAdams in this movie?”
- ”Ben Affleck wishes he was a turtle right now.”
- ”Aren’t they worried about the water buffalo trying to get in the car?”
- ”Hey, didn’t Ben Affleck’s character have a job…?”
- ”Welcome to Sonic. Can I take your order?”
- ”I’m going to walk across the lawn again.”
I’m completely willing to admit that it’s possible I missed the point. In fact, it’s more than possible. After all, I only have a Master’s degree in literature and two decades of acting, directing, and playwriting in my pocket. I can say without reservation that I certainly found the film wonderful to look at, and Olga Kurylenko was very good as the emotionally frustrated (and frustrating) Marina. She has a handful of incredibly expressive moments, including some that are heartbreaking and one involving a washing machine hose that is truly adorable. But there comes a point, in a film about people who mostly walk in and out of rooms without a word, that one has to imagine the director, sitting in his canvas chair, advising the actors thusly: “Okay, Ben, you’re mad, and you’re walking across the back yard. Got it? Okay. Action! Okay, Olga? You’re in a field, and you’re sad. Got it? All right, let’s get this one before we lose the light.”
Obviously, I haven’t the skill or pedigree to say that Malick was wrong in any of his choices or that his story could have been told in a better way. It’s his story, after all. He is the writer and director of the piece, and his films are notorious for leaving out at least as much footage (and story) as they leave in. Some of those lovely scenery shots, by the way? Leftovers from Tree of Life. And why not? He’s got the footage of water or rocks or turtles … why not throw in a turtle?
I would not, under any circumstances, tell anyone not to see this film. Having fallen in love with his Days of Heaven recently while reviewing it for Ebertfest, I can say that you will not find a director who more lovingly or painstakingly paints a picture with the camera. You may find this film captivating, breathtaking, and utterly heartbreaking. Or, failing that, you might have a hell of a good time wondering what happened to that turtle.
To the Wonder continues all this week at Champaign’s beloved Art Theater Co-op. Check the website for times, view the trailer, and go pay your respects to a storyteller who is, for better or worse, undeniably in a league of his own.