Terrence Malick is a filmmaker you will either love or hate.  His movies have become meditations on life.  They aren’t movies that require long patience like an Andrei Tarkovsky film that can either bore you or put you into a meditative mood.  I think Malick and Tarkovsky share the most similarities as filmmakers, but I think Malick has a faster sense of pacing.  TO THE WONDER is Malick’s latest meditation on relationships and the decisions that can tear apart them apart and the things that bring people back together.  The story is told through visuals and music in addition to inner thought narration by the four main characters.   Malick wants you to decide what is going on with the lives of these people and where they might end up after the movie is over.  The movie mostly revolves around Neil (Ben Affleck) and his relationships with a French woman named Marina (Olga Kurylenko) and an old friend Jane (Rachel McAdams).  It also focuses on the crisis of faith that Father Quintana (Javier Bardem) has throughout the film.  TO THE WONDER is interesting meditation to look at, but sometimes it is frustrating due to how Malick muffles out dialogue in many of the scenes instead choosing to focus on the visuals, music, and internal monologues more.  Malick is more interested in trying to put together a non-traditional narrative which may leave viewers cold and thinking this is a horrible movie.

 

SPECIAL FEATURES:

THE MAKING OF TO THE WONDER is a ten minute making-of featurette that has behind-the-scenes interviews with cast and crew (minus Terrence Malick who isn’t interviewed for the extras).  This featurette is an edited together piece of the next three featurettes.

THE ACTORS’ EXPERIENCE- The cast recount how it is to work with Terrence Malick and how it is different from other movie productions

THE BALLET- Cast and crew remark how light, weather, and locations affect the scenes in the movie that makes it feel like a ballet.

LOCAL FLAVOR- how a town in Oklahoma and its people played a key part in the production of TO THE WONDER.

 

Also included on the disc are the original theatrical trailer and trailers for SHADOW DANCER and a couple of other movies.

 

FINAL ANALYSIS:   TO THE WONDER is an interesting piece of visual filmmaking which reminds me a little of Andrei Tarkovsky.  The film may test the patience of some viewers who are used to a more traditional style of storytelling.

 

This DVD review is (c)8-12-2013 David Blackwell and cannot be reprinted without permission.  Send all comments to feedback@enterline-media.com

 

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