To The Wonder (2012)

[baumer]

Discuss

[CoolioD1]

I just can't handle the Malick anymore it seems. I liked his early work, but Tree of Life was pretty overrated and this one is certainly exclusively for the diehard fans.

 

Olga Kurylenko frolics a lot, as in she jumps around and waves her arms and shit. She frolics around in fields, in muddy beaches, in Wal-Mart, she frolics while holding a rooster, she frolics jumping up and down on her bed. But then she gets these sad looks on her face and argues with Ben Affleck, so she leaves and Rachel McAdams comes in for about ten minutes to frolic and get these sad looks on her face and argue with Ben Affleck and leaves, then Olga Kurylenko comes back to repeat the same pattern for the final six hours of the film. And of course through most of this Olga is describing this epic romance in whispered narration about how we love and our love is loved and how love comes from the clouds etc, etc.

 

Also Ben Affleck's a total blank slate and doesn't do much except stare goofily at the girls while they frolic around. Occasionaly he joins in.

 

Oh, and there's some sub-plot to do with Javier Bardem as a priest who's kinda losing his faith. He also gets to do some whispered narration about love. I actually kinda liked that. There's some interesting stuff in there.

 

Like all Malick films it looks absolutely stunning and there's some great music in here too. It's quite the achievement in those regards, and like I said there's something interesting about the whole Bardem bit so I think I'll give it a C. Though overall not really my thing.

[RichWS]

Brief thoughts: It's a "wonder" of visuals and music, yet repetitive and overlong. I was responding to the themes Malick was playing with, but it's ultimately impossible to truly connect with the film. You realize the actors aren't playing people; they're beautiful empty ciphers. Overall, a mixed bag. 

 

GRADE: B-

[acsc1312]

[Gopher]

I turned it off after 30 minutes so I won't grade or pass much judgement on the film. All I'll say is that if you're going to cast two people to jump and dance and run and love each other wordlessly, why the hell would you cast Ben Affleck? I love the guy, but he is so NOT the most expressive actor. Not to mention he looks like a dirty old man compared to Kurylenko.

Edited April 16, 2013 by Gopher

[acsc1312]

[CoolioD1]

.

[Plain Old Tele]

Thanks Coolio.

[acsc1312]

Frolicky Malick doing his thing. Music and cinematography really work. Everything else, ehhhh. McAdams didn't even need to be in the damn thing. Bardem's story was kind of interesting, but this was really a bore.

 

C+

Edited May 13, 2013 by acsc1312

[acsc1312]

Also, why did Malick write such and insufferable infantile character for Olga. She was annoying with her dancing around the whole time for no reason. I wished Affleck would've left her on the side of the road after Sonic.

[Jack Nevada]

It really is a beautiful film. Emmanuel Lubezki's visuals are just out of this world as is the score by Hanan Townsend, whoever that is, and when you put those two together.. good stuff. I also adore the way Malick works with child actors. In Tree of Life and this its just miraculous how natural all the kids seem in front of the camera.

 

The first hour is just full of memorable imagery, and I was really digging it despite the annoying voiceover. The second hour is disappointingly boring, and it felt like Terence Malick had run out of ideas. I started to fall asleep and go "Come on, wrap this shit up"

 

If you had cut this down to 85-90 minutes it would be a 4/5 but right now its a

 

3/5

Edited June 8, 2013 by Jack Nevada

[TheMovieman]

This was a completely and utterly boring and, surprisingly, vapid movie. I would say the characters are unlikeable but that would mean they had anything to offer other than staring off into the distance (when Kurylenko isn't frolicing) or, in the case of Affleck, wandering around a barren yard or empty rooms. On the plus side, Javier Bardem's side story wasn't terrible and I didn't fall asleep, though I watched this in the morning.

 

Despite some stunning cinematography, the whispering of nonsense and lack of an interesting story or coherent characters makes this a one-time viewing for me. And at 113-minutes, I shudder to think what this movie would've been had Malick kept in Rachel Weisz and Jessica Chastain's characters...

 

**¼/*****, (C-, 4.4/10, 1.75/4)

 

(and that's only because of Lubezki's cinematography).

[Kvikk Lunsj]

Malick disappoints, the film is to long for the story it was trying to tell. This movie should have been around 80 minutes. I feel like the character have no depth to them. I have no feeling towards them.  The whispering got to annoying. I loved the Tree of Life but Tree of Life worked as whole film. Malick's filming style worked in that film and I liked the characters in the film. In these film everybody feels the same. Affect had like no lines and just stood there.

C-