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Stuff About Terrence Malick
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Trailer for Malick's A Hidden Life.
"So, when she came in to meet Terry, she looked at him and said, 'I liked your script.' He hired her on the spot! Just like that! Immediately!" Names and Days of Heaven.
Spot for the Google Pixel 3, created "in collaboration with Terrence Malick." Hmmm. Via John Gruber
"It can be difficult or impossible to know how much time has passed between scenes, or even between shots. With every cut, the world is reborn and seen anew." Let the Wind Speak. Kent Jones on Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life. Amen.
C&B goes long on Terrence Malick's The New World. The interview with cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki is especially good.
Film School Rejects on What We Learned from Terrence Malick's SXSW Appearance.
Alternate Ending For TM's The Tree Of Life.
The Not-So-Secret Life of Terrence Malick, by Eric Benson for Texas Monthly.
"Malick's goal as a filmmaker is to educate the human eye to see like his camera does. If our habits of vision are characterized by ambition, skepticism and greed, Malick inspires us with the virtues of patience, appreciation and awe. He offers not new facts or arguments but persuasive images of the world as if filtered through such virtues. Alongside these images he presents a character in each film who expresses, with increasing confidence and dignity, the point of view epitomized by the camera." The Perspective of Terrence Malick, by John Baskin for The Point.
I don't buy many films on disc anymore, but I will but this one, The New World from Criterion New 4K digital restoration of the 172-minute extended cut of the film, supervised by cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki and director Terrence Malick.
"In a brand new video created by Vugar Efendi, the natural scenes of Terrence Malick's films have been compiled into one continuous and gorgeous stream of environmental consciousness..."
Terrence Malick's Weightless slated for late June release in UK.
"At first I felt it was kind of an invasion of privacy and then I was like, Fuck it, this is the realest thing that has happened all day." Terrence Malick Knight of Cups movie shoot.
MSZ shares a few words with Haskell Wexler about Days of Heaven.
Brilliant and ruminative essay on Terrence Malick, spirituality and The Thin Red Line primarily, by Reno Lauro for Mubi.
Related the the last. "...the photography was to be processed to be visually beautiful and to ensure this beauty existed within the world I was trying to show, suggesting that which was lost, or what we were now losing." Rare DoH interview with Malick from the book Quinze Hommes Splendides by Yvonne Baby.
Nice compilation post on Terrence Malick's Days of Heaven featuring interviews, the script and videos, at Cinephilia.
Storyboards, script and links to resources about the making of Terrence Malick's The Thin Red Line.
"Narrative formalities, which have had an increasingly immaterial presence in Malick's work since The Thin Red Line's meandering freeform-like structure, but now they are almost entirely absent..." Adam Cook and Daniel Kasman at Berlinale 2015, chatting about Knight of Cups.
Trailer for Terrence Malick's Knight of Cups which is slated to debut at the Berlin Film Festival.
"From the first scene of his first film, voiceover has been a crucial element of Terrence Malick's work..." A video essay by Scott Tobias of The Dissolve.
A new trailer for 2001: A Space Odyssey to coincide with a UK cinema rerelease. It's excellent but (of course) I have one small quibble. The small-caps used for the quote attributions really don't work at all. Via John Gruber.
"His camera thus takes a disinterested stance, focusing instead on the images of wheat and sky, seeing Bill's plot as a natural event as common as the seasons." Peter Labuza on Days of Heaven from an excerpt from Approaching the End: Imagining Apocalypse in American Film.
Chris O'Falt has the latest on Knight of Cups, The Untitled Austin Film and Voyage of Time, three films in various states of production from Terrence Malick.
Don't hold your breath but Terrence Malick's Voyage Of Time project is coming together for a 2016 release.
The sad state of municipal logos in Canada, by Luke Simcoe. Thanks Marshall.
How could I not link this? Adrian Curry's movie poster of the day is for Days of Heaven from the UK.
Ten things Kim Hendrickson learned about Badlands.
The Playlist has Terrence Malick working on Tree Of Life director's cut and a couple hints about the Voyage of Time IMAX project.
Terrence Malick at the Delicatessen, by Chris Okum.
David Hudson collect links and reviews about the new Criterion release of Terrence Malick's Badlands, including a great video interview with editor Billy Weber who talks about "how the voice-over in Malick's first film came to be, how it was influenced by Truffaut, and how the collaborators' process evolved when they worked together again on Days of Heaven.
Behind the scenes videos from To the Wonder, the new film by Terrence Malick.
Paul Maher Jr. interviews Jeff McArthur, whose Grandfather defended Caril Fugate for her part in the Starkweather murder trial, the case on which Terrence Malick's Badlands was based.
Regarding the "Swashbuckle" post, tons more swashiness from Mark Simonson's Bookmania. Yowza.
Trailer for Malicks's To the Wonder.
"Increasingly I've come to think of Malick as a choreographer." Darren Hughes mixed review of To the Wonder. Can't wait.
Martyn Conterio thinks Terrence Malick should direct Star Wars Episode VII.
Terrence Malick's To the Wonder premiered in Venice.
Terrence Malick's To the Wonder is slated to Premiere at The Venice Film Festival in late August.
Collider reports Terrence Malick's next film has been titled To the Wonder.
The band Explosions in the Sky wanted to emulate a bit of Tree of Life for their music vid for Postcard From 1952, so much so that they hired the film's 2nd unit cinematographer to co-direct it for them. The making-of is here. Via AV Club.
Ebert reconsiders his ten greatest films of all time for Sight & Sound's poll, done once each decade, and makes a brave addition. Amen. Here's the compiled list from 2002.
"So consider, for a second, that when we talk about voiceover we're not really talking about words. Voiceover can be a form of intimacy. The human voice - its timbre, the way it echoes in your mind - is one of the most cinematic things we have." Bilge Ebiri on Malick, Kubrick and Narration, Voiceover, and the Shape of the World. Via All Things Shining.
An interesting look at the differences between the script for Days of Heaven and the film itself, by Angela Havel.
An interesting interview with Jack Fisk, who has served as production designer on a number of Terrence Malick's films.
"You get it together and we'll come and shoot." Jack Fisk Climbs The Tree of Life.
"The most magical section of the movie for me and the section that is pure Terry happens after the group comes back for R and R and rest and celebrates and Ben Chaplain's character goes walking. There is some great voice-over ( I think John D is doing it and then Ben). It is about 10 minutes long and for me quite magical and the best piece of score that Hans wrote. It is very meditative and quite moving." All Things Shining Interviews Billy Weber, editor on Terrence Malick's films.
David Hudson summarizes the latest Terrence Malick news, and there's plenty if it. Also, Steven Zeitchik has some details on the film formerly known as The Burial.
Variety teases two new Terrence Malick films, Lawless and King of Cups. A pretty busy schedule for an artist who regularly went years between films.
Some news on Terrence Malick's next film from The Film Stage.
"Since we could see the rushes immediately and it was apparent the results were adding to the visual presentation of the story, we became more and more daring, using less and less artificial light, preferring the look of the raw, natural images. " Required reading for students of film and film lighting, and fans of Malick. DP Nestor Almendros on shooting Days of Heaven, at All Things Shining.
Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life: A Few Thoughts Subsequent to a Local Screening Sponsored by a College's Theology Department, by Joe McCulloch.
Malick & Me, by David Handelman, including a link to download his 1985 California Magazine piece Absence of Malick. Via All Things Shining.
Matt Hannigan writes, "This is a great list of every piece of music used in Tree of Life. I found it quite helpful to find the pieces that are not on the soundtrack." Thanks for that.
"The work as a whole carries a more potent purpose once the connection is made between the voiceovers and imagery." Paul Maher Jr. on The Tree of LifeBlu-ray.
"This iconic photograph by Henry Hamilton Bennett was featured in the opening credits of Days of Heaven." Here's Art of the Title on the title sequence and an excellent shot-by-shot analysis by James Blake Ewing.
Malick and Christian Bale.
"The heavenly feeling in the movie is not really there in what happens to the people. The plot is full of tragedy, loss and separation, and of a briefly glimpsed paradise that cannot sustain human shortcomings." Is Days of Heaven the most beautiful film ever made? by David Thomson.
An anonymous reader sent Paul Maher Jr. a copy of Filmmakers Newsletter from 1974 which includes a rare Terrence Malick Interview and a very nice image on the cover.
Tree of Life blu-ray October 11.
All Things Shining reprints Helen Thorpe's excellent 1998 profile of Terrence Malick, The Man Who Wasn't There from Texas Monthly.
He's not the only connection between 2001 and Tree of Life but he is a pretty important one, Phelim O'Neill interviews Douglas Trumbull.
Fandor tracks down many of the sources and artists behind the some of the amazing images from The Tree of Life. Parts one and two. See, especially, the work of Thomas Wilfred.
"No script, nothing, I just watched the movie and rambled on... I dunno, they took whatever dialogue they liked." Nick Pinkerton interviews Linda Manz for the Village Voice. Manz was the narrator and in many ways, the protagonist of Days of Heaven. Via Paul Maher Jr.
Poster for Tree of Life from Japan.
Philippe Theophanidis points to actual copies of Terrence Malick's notice to projectionists regarding Tree of Life and Kubrick's note about Barry Lyndon.
Related to the last. Terrence Malick's instructions on how to project Tree Of Life;
Days of Heaven in stills. It doesn't replace seeing the film but it sure helps illustrating a discussion about it.
Malick is preparing a much longer cut of Tree of Life according to a feature in the June edition of Cahiers du Cinema. Lovely cover on that.
Christopher Nolan and David Fincher talk about Terrence Malick. (View Featurette.)
"Theory, here, is subject to light irony and realized in and through the techniques that, in aggregate, comprise the film's style." An academic viewing of The New World by Richard Neer, University of Chicago.
jeff Martin watched Tree of Life in a mall theater in Bartlesville, Oklahoma while sitting a row in front of Terrence Malick's mother.
"...the natural world and the divine presence that created it has increasingly assumed greater import than the petty affairs of men." Inside the mind of Terrence Malick, by Peter Howell.
Jack Fisk, "The whole crew changed over several times, except for the art department and the actors. The people that money was important to left early, and the rest of us made a great film." Awesome, the making of Badlands: An Oral History by Nathaniel Penn for GQ.
The only real news in this story is that Terrence Malick's favorite movie is Zoolander, but that's pretty good.
An actual photo of Terrence Malick at the ToL Cannes premiere.
There's a new short clip from Tree of Life up at iTunes. I can't tell you anything about it because I have gone into lock-down mode until I see the film on 6/3.
ToL producer Bill Pohlad chats with Hunter Daniels about Malick's Voyage of Time, potentially for Imax. Call me skeptical.
"...Nabokov's knowing remark that only one letter divides the comic from the cosmic would touch no chord in Malick." Anthony Lane on ToL for The New Yorker. A beautifully written review.
Tree of Life wins the Palme d'Or.
Steven Zeitchik looks for Terrence Malick through conversations with his collaborators for the LAT.
Local note. Malick's Tree of Life opens in Chicago at the Century on Friday, June 3.
"Nobody had that much to say in Ye Olden Times, unlike now, when apparently no one will shut up!" Choire Sicah thinks you should Leave Terrence Malick Alone. Amen.
I'm doing my best to avoid reading detailed reviews of Tree of Life in hopes of seeing it at least somewhat fresh when it opens in the US. David Hudson's frequently updated entry on the film for Mubi is a good place to get a feel for what people are saying with links (that I'm not clicking) to the most interesting reviews.
"The film is an affirmation of Mr. Malick's belief in the power of cinematic images to express the sublime... and, perhaps, of his faith in the audience to meet him with equivalent seriousness." Manohla Dargis on ToL.
"I don't know why people who make things in our business are expected to sell them..." Steven Zeitchik's notes from the ToL presser in Cannes today.
David Hudson runs down the buzz about today's Tree of Life Cannes screenings. Lots more about the film and Terrence Malick in our archives.
Divided opinions for the first ToL screening at Cannes today, as expected.
All Things Shining / The Thin Red Line, by Matt Zoller Seitz. The third essay accompanying The Museum of Moving Image series on Malick. Read them all.
Tree of Life Press Kit Production Notes, pdf, 5/5/11.
"So we followed the butterfly through three blocks of Smithville. Jessica gracefully stepped out into the middle of the street, backlit by the morning sun. She held her hand out and the butterfly came full circle and landed directly on it. It stayed there for some time." ICG Magazine goes into great detail on the camera crew, cinematography, lighting (or lack of it), film formats, etc on Tree of Life. Sights Unseen by Bob Fisher.
David Hudson on Terrence Malick in NYC and LA. Sadly we're not in either place, even sadder, we won't we be in Cannes Monday for the ToL screenings.
A lovely poster for a Brazilian screening of Badlands.
Trailer for The Unforeseen, a doc on the environment versus development near Austin, by Laura Dunn and produced by Terrence Malick and Robert Redford.
"Once you start shooting without film lights, and you go twenty days without using an HMI, if you then put up film lights, they look really bad. It just doesn't make sense. If you really look carefully at natural light, you realize how complex it is, and how it's constantly shifting... So we burned our bridges, and sent all the lights back to the rental house." Kodak InCamera chats with Tree of Life DP Emmanuel Lubezki.
Brad Pitt interview in Studio Cine Live, mostly about ToL.
Probably not an actual review of ToL but interesting anyhow. Or maybe not, you decide. Here it is, machine translated from the French.
Local note for Cannes. Tree of Life on Monday at 8:30a, 3pm and 7pm. Festival sked pdf.
Project Neon need a kick. Via Typedia News for May.
A thoughtful piece on nature, philosophy and Malick by Charles Ealy of Austin 360.
"Compare Days of Heaven with another masterpiece from the same period, Stanley Kubrick's Barry Lyndon. Both films embed their human beings in implacable environments and step back to a detached vantage, observing our earthly thrashings wordlessly." Elbert Ventura for Reverse Shot.
Lovely new extended sequence from Tree of Life at EW. Not your typical "teaser" at all.
Local note. Days of Heaven projected. Saturday and Sunday mornings at The Music Box.
"Each film, curiously, feels like an obituary. Death is always present, be it the death of time, life, experience or innocence and all that it creates and leaves behind." Martyn Conterio on Malick for Little White Lies.
Nine slides on The Making Of The Tree Of Life, from TotalFilm.
"I think he shoots about 35 films and makes the one that he wants, but he kind of knows all along. What he's looking for is the accident: he wants the accidents to happen. I suspect he throws out a lot of magnificent work." Empire Magazine talks with actress Fiona Shaw about working with Terrence Malick on Tree Of Life. Via IMBD.
Related, Alexandre Desplat's soundtrack for ToL is up and streaming at Amazon already. Via The Daily Mubi.
This new international poster for Tree Of Life is completely out of character with the rest of the marketing and more than a little puzzling. It also lists this distributor site. Hmm.
"Americans feel entitled to happiness, or, once they manage to find it, they feel as if they own it. If they are deprived of it, they feel cheated. If they feel it has been taken away from them, they imagine they have done wrong. This guilt, I have felt it from everyone I've known. It's a bit like a Dylan song: they have held the world in their hands and let it slip through their fingers."
An interview for Le Monde with Terrence Malick from 1979, translated by Hugues Fournier and Paul Maher Jr., from the book by Yvonne Baby, Quinze Hommes Splendides.
"If Kubrick and Malick ares masters, as no-one seems to tire of saying, what does that make us? Slaves?" Smart observation by Tom Shone. Here's David Thomson's piece in The Guardian that inspired it. Via Mubi.
The Tree Of Life on Twitter.
"Something radical." The skinny on Cannes 2011 from David Hudson.
ToL will be in competition (not just a screening) at Cannes.
"Saw it at a distributer screening last night as I am in a lucky position that my brother is part of the Icon New Zealand distributor team. All I can say is that Pitt is gonna win an Oscar but this is too out there for Best Picture. I can't say anything else..." Round up of ToL news from The Film Stage including a new French poster and speculation about release date and format.
Tree of Life's Multiple Branches, by Steven Zeitchik.
Tim Robey on Malick, from this weekend's Telegraph, Hollywood's Poet Returns.
"and then, when the sun started to drop... we would run like hell from one place to another." Shooting Days of Heaven, from the Criterion DVD extras, an interview with camera operator John Bailey on lighting and timing to the sun. The clip is out of sync but it doesn't really matter.
A 1976 draft Days of Heaven script which contains lots more dialogue and exposition (and no v/o) than the final film.
ToL site up.
Terrence Malick's cameo in Badlands. Supposedly the actor cast in the role didn't show so TM stepped in.
Two Ways Through Life. An enigmatic series of stills from ToL.
The Thin Red Line Berlin Film Festival Press Conference.
Just in case you, reading this, are Terrence Malick, and just in case, despite your decades long policy of not giving interviews, you think it might be time to talk a little about Tree of Life or pretty much anything else with someone who is not "the press" but instead a sympathetic follower and champion of your work, well then, please use the contact link below. And, in any case, thanks a million for the films. -Jim.
Local note. April 23 through May 29, Malick at the Music Box. Pocket Money, Badlands, Days of Heaven, Thin Red Line, New World, Undertow. PDF.
"I’ve been thinking what to do with my future. I could be a mud doctor, checking out the earth underneath." We've made no secret of the fact that in our estimation Terrence Malick is second only to one artist in our listing of modern filmmakers. His 1978 Days of Heaven has never been lower than the top five of any list of best films we have ever constructed. Criterion has recently released a new Bluray edition of the film and while it can't compete with a clean 35mm print in a dark theater, it's pretty damn good, the transfer especially. A few random bits worth checking: Elbert Ventura's appreciation at Reverse Shot, Roger Ebert's. The opening credits featuring Camille Saint-Saëns Aquarium. Some local notes on the shoot and a recent interview with art director Jack Fisk.
Related, French ToL poster.
Terrence Malick's Tree of Life set for Cannes. I think they mean it this year.
"The Thin Red Line is a complete experiment. It's very rare these days that Hollywood is prepared to let you make an art house movie and throw all caution to the wind. We worked in complete and utter privacy and isolation. I read the first version of the script and said to Terrence there's no way anybody could make this. Terry said, you're absolutely right, let's not ever read the script again." Hans Zimmer on working with Terrence Malick. Via All Things Shining.
Maybe it finally is time to set up a Stuff About Terrence Malick archive. It would go nicely with our Stuff About Stanley Kubrick one.
"He might shoot something on a Super 8 camera, then an IMAX camera, then on a digital camera, but in space you might have something based on magnetic resonance imaging or infrared photography from the Hubble. Each would have its own character, and that in his mind would lend to authenticity because you weren't trying to smooth it, shape it and make it conform." The visual effects team on Terrence Malick's Tree of Life talks about the work.
Five minutes from Rosy-Fingered Dawn, an Italian documentary on CP hero Terrence Malick.
"For a while they lived together in a tree house." Alternate Badlands poster. Fab.
James Blake Ewing walks through the Days of Heaven titles, one image at a time.
"The films, though are still driven by Malick's breathtaking visuals, have the pervading idea that life moves through us, with us, and without us, and we are just a part of its waltzing tide." James Merolla on Malick for Sound On Sight.
The Thin Red Line Script pdf.
Arrival in The New World, an audio interview about Malick with Production Designer Jack Fisk.
"We are all having a lot of fun listening to Terrence Malick. He is just like the movies he makes: warm, clever and extremely articulate." Rome, 2007.
The Art of the Title Sequence features Dan Perri's work on Days of Heaven.
Related to the last. Since there's not much to do but wait until May 27th for ToL, here's Peter Biskind's 1999 VF feature on Malick, The Runaway Genius that notes, among other things, that there's a TM script for Walker Percy's The Moviegoer somewhere. Yowza.
"Man, was I depressed. I called Terrence Malick and told him of my evaluation. We discussed that we'd most likely have to transfer the original IP (interpositive), but that I was going to try to get Paramount to make a new one. Much to my surprise, they agreed..." Lee Kline on the work going into a new transfer of Malick's Days of Heaven.
"He spent 20 minutes about an inch away from all my sexual organs, lovingly rubbing my unborn child. Talk about a perfect day." Information is hard to come by about CP hero Terrence Malick's new film The Tree of Life but we'll post what we find.
I'm not watching a cam version of it, so I don't have much to say. But maybe you want to. The trailer Malick's for Tree of Life that's currently attached to Black Swan in theaters. It probably won't be up for long.
Oh crap, Copperplate. First poster for Malick's Tree of Life.
Copperplate and metallic-looking reflections. Oh Terrence, call quick, we can help. Update: Nobody asked me but...
Terence Malick's The Tree of Life is rumored for May 27 release. I am going to get in line now.
"According to one of The Thin Red Line's three editors, Billy Weber, Malick saw a full version of the film exactly once: a five-hour work print assembled during the 18-month-long post-production process, and screened for him under some duress." Absence of Malick, Jessica Winter learns quite a lot about how CP hero Terrence Malick works, by watching the TRL DVD extras.
"Nature and grace." Steven Zeitchik of the LAT is reading tea leaves on The Tree of Life.
Paul Maher's summation of the saga of Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life production, and more recently, maybe, perhaps, possibly, we'll see the film soon. Or soon-ish.
Malick's Tree of Life ready?
The rush to finish TTRL, by Paul Maher Jr.
A large collection of stills collected by Evan Richards, The Cinematography of The Thin Red Line.
Big ToL news. A script has surfaced. More from The Playlist.
The Calm Before The Tree of Life, by Paul Maher. Not much new information but this is a great summary of the ToL story so far.
"The Malick project will be Trumbull's first feature credit since Brainstorm. Malick is working on two films, a long-awaited cosmic family drama starring Brad Pitt called Tree of Life, and an accompanying IMAX movie." Rebecca Keegan reports that Douglas Trumbull (2001, Close Encounters, Blade Runner) is working with Terrence Malick.
"I called one of my friends up and said, 'What does an art director do?'" A Filmmaker Magazine
conversation with Jack Fisk on starting out, Terrence Malick and Days of Heaven. Plus, a NYT piece from 2008.
Rumors of a Tree Of Life screening. Hmm.
Film lineup for Cannes 2010. Sadly, no mention of Terrence Malick's Tree of Life.
Hero Terrence Malick to direct Sir Gawain And The Green Night after ToL? Also, a new transfer of Days of Heaven has been released on Blu-ray and it looks like TTRL is next.
"...a bottomless movie, almost unspeakably beautiful and formally harmonious." Among the many "best of the decade" lists, I'm with John Patterson, writing about Malick's The New World, A Misunderstood Masterpiece?
Cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki talking about Terrence Malick not watching dailies, finding truth, working without lights and knowing the sounds of the birds.
A "painter's way of directing." Neil Innes on Terrence Malick, The Reluctant Auteur.
Well, as if we weren't hungry enough already... Composer Alexandre Desplat, speaking in Greece, offers up a few tantalizing morsels on working with Terrence Malick on ToL. Related: cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki.
"TERRY: Well, I appreciate your interest. I guess I do feel uncomfortable talking about it." Interesting Joe Gillis memoir on Terrence Malick.
Sam Shepard talks about working on Days of Heaven with CP hero Terrence Malick. Also, see Elbert Ventura's piece for Reverse Shot. "For many of the scenes, (Linda) Manz was asked to view the footage and comment on the action as she interpreted it, words that then became the film's voiceover."
"Here is a filmmaker with a clear sensibility and aesthetic who makes narrative films that are neither literary nor theatrical, in the sense of foregrounding dialogue, event, or character, but are instead principally cinematic, movies that suggest narrative, emotion, and idea through image and sound." A Stitch in Time, Chris Wisniewski's thoughtful analysis of Malick's editing style for Reverse Shot.
Days of Heaven a new, Malick-supervised transfer.
Nick Pinkerton in Stop Smiling on The New World. Me, here, on the same. I hold Malick's Days of Heaven in the highest esteem. TNW may be a better, more intelligent film than Days. The cool part is I'm not sure yet. I have to see it again. Probably more than once and I'll do that while I can see it projected.
The Terrence Malick Enigma, by Caryn James for the NYT.