TIFF Review- To the Wonder

Logline: A romantic drama centered on a man who reconnects with a woman from his hometown after his marriage to a European woman falls apart.

Cast: Ben Affleck, Olga Kurylenko, Rachel McAdams, Javier Bardem

Directed by: Terrence Malick

 

I was soooooooooo disappointed that I was late getting Toronto International Film Festival tickets this year. I heard that Terry Malick's new film To the Wonder was making its North American debut and I was angry with myself when I went online to buy tickets and every showing was sold out completely. I quickly hopped on Kijiji looking to see if anyone was trying to sell their tickets, but to my dismay the cheapest tickets were $150 each and they had to be sold in a package of four. Can you believe that price? I'm not kidding. I guess it was raised because it included a pass to the red carpet to meet the stars of the film. Still though, I just wanted to see this movie, badly.

I was standing in line with my friend waiting for The Iceman theatre to start letting people in and there were two guys in front of us that pulled a TIFF employee aside asking if there was any way to refund tickets or get a re-showing. She looked at the tickets and turned them away saying not for that movie, we don't do that. He then turned to us and asked if we were interested in buying tickets for To the Wonder... Like, are you serious? That actually happened. Call it fate. I said heck yeah! It happened to be showing just 1 hour after The Iceman finished too, so the timing was perfect! I couldn't believe it. I bought two tickets for $25 - for both of 'em!

Summary

Terrence Malick is one of a kind. I'm not too sure what he did in all those years he went AWOL, but he must have done some serious soul searching because this movie explores a very broad and undefined topic.

The "story", I guess you could call it, follows the life of a woman (Olga Kurylenko) and her love story with a man (Ben Affleck). They begin in France, exploring this beautiful castle - and then the man asks and her daughter her to come back to America with him. This is Malick's attempt to explore love and everything to do with it.

Review & Topic of the Day

There is no way I can divide this movie into two categories, I just need to spill my beliefs into one unorganized segment.

About a month or so ago I did a review on The Tree of Life and I stated that it wasn't really a movie - it was a poem explored through moving images. Call it poetry in motion if you will. To the Wonder is exactly the same as The Tree of Life in terms of delivery and style. I'm all for objectivity and the fact that everyone has their own opinion, but when it comes to the direction and cinematography of Terry's latest work, I don't think you can deny his excellence. You may disagree with his thoughts and his structure (or lack of one), but you have to give him credit for what he's able to do with a camera. It's astounding. I would even go as far as saying that Terry's films provide the absolute best cinematography of any movie created by leaps and bounds. Take that for a statement and let it soak in for a second.

Does Malick succeed in his journey through these characters to ultimately define love? Well, the answer to that is both yes and no. No, because it's really hard to sit there at the end of this movie and think to yourself - "ah, I get it now; that's what love is." If you did, and you're reading this, please leave a comment because I'd love to hear your opinion. I believe he succeeded because he makes people think. That's what poetry is meant to do, isn't it? It gives you this concept, it explores it very well with many layers, and then it leaves you with the content and it's up to you to decide what you want to take from it. It can definitely leave you frustrated, but that's only if you go searching for the meaning within it. For me, it just came naturally.

Malick has a weird way of exploring his characters. In an interview with Olga Kurylenko, she said that she had about 3 hours worth of dialogue and hardly any of it was even in the movie. She also said that it was very rare she got to speak on important takes. Malick would get her to say the words under her breath and act them as if she were saying them without moving her lips. That's his weird way of getting emotion out of characters. He gives you just enough to grasp what's going on, but then turns the page and uses whispers and human movement/emotion to capture the essence of his message. The character of the woman was different. She was very dark and gloomy. The man strong and silent. Most of the movie they hardly talk to one another, so it's kind of hard to connect with them, but the way they move is spiritual. Malick always expects to bring out the big picture in things. And this is moreso I think done with the character of the priest played by Javier Bardem. He goes around dealing with the mentally sick and criminals of the world. Through him we get a sense of where love sits on the scale of planet Earth. People who lack love, people who aren't love, people who are searching for love - they all give us different angles on the subject at hand, which is the love between these two humans. He never says their names because they're not individuals - they're symbols of love; icons of the true meanings of the movie.

I think the message I took strongly from this was the fact that love isn't what most people think it is and that society views it totally wrong. Everyone views it as this eternal greatness and satisfaction - the ultimate bond between two people. And that's mostly true because that's kind of what it is. But it's not eternal. Being humans we all make mistakes, we all get agitated, we all do things we regret, we all learn and grow differently from the people we were a few years ago. Love isn't a fairytale. It's pretty cruel and it's really hard to enjoy at times, but it's getting through those hard times - because in the end, all that really matters is that we learn from our two "icons"(characters) and don't end up like they do.

I love how Malick makes his viewers think and I love his visuals. Right now he is the most interesting director out there in my opinion and he has this mystique to him that makes me really interested as to what goes through his head. I really wish he'd do an interview one day. We'll see I guess. 

I am frustrated with most of the bad reviews so far because all of these critics claimed they "didn't get it", simply dismissing the movie as "rubbish" and "meaningless". Maybe they didn't get it, but I certainly took from it, and I think that if a film does that it has to serve some purpose. I'm glad the film is getting a generally positive critical response (83% on RT so far, 7.3 on imdb) because with a film like this it's quite hard to expect the majority of this world to respect it, so those are actually quite high ratings.

Consensus

To the Wonder is beautifully filmed poetry in motion. Terrence Malick has created another work of art that is filled with deep layers of emotion and love. This will go down as one of the most controversial movies of 2012, as The Tree of Life did in 2011, but I'll always remember it as a movie that taught me something. For the reason that its message will stick with me, this film is timeless, making its rating something special.

9.2/10