MovieChat Forums > The Tree of Life (2011) Discussion > Anyone who calls this film visually impr...

Anyone who calls this film visually impressive needs to study science.


Absolutely OUTRAGEOUS. A dismal, dismal film, perhaps the WORST ever I've watched in my life. Hey? What are the images from the Hubble space telescope doing here? What's the Horse-head nebula, the Cat's eye nebula, the Pillars of Creation nebula doing HERE?

Hey Mallick, that's not even your art, not even your visual imagination. Its something real scientists worked on, sent up telescopes into space to photograph with great difficulty and cost. HOW DARE do you use those images to 'beautify' your ridiculous excuse of a movie, and use them as a make-up to increase your movie's rating? What did YOU do on your own? What the hell do those images even have to do with movie? Absolutely shameful. And ROTTEN rotten tomato critics. How DARE you praise this film based on its visuals? What meat is there in this film anyways? Anyone could just take images from the Hubble and make a movie about it, would be just as beautiful? Don't you guys ever watch Discovery? The History Channel? Have you no idea what you're looking at?

Anyone, Anyone here who DARES to call this film 'visually impressive' has to attend a science class, or watch a science documentary IMMEDIATELY! This film is almost like stolen work. I can name EVERY single visual scene in this movie and tell you where it came from.

1) Some interstellar clouds, a shape that looks like a horse -> Straight from the Hubble telescope gallery, image of the "Horse Head Nebula."
2) Some interstellar clouds, something looks like an eye -> Straight from the Hubble telescope gallery, image of the "Cat's Eye Nebula."
3) Some interstellar clouds, something looks like pillars -> Straight from the Hubble telescope gallery, image of the "The Pillars of Creation, in the Eagle Nebula"
4) Images of the surface of a sun/star. -> Straight from images from the SOHO Observatory gallery, images of the surface of the sun.
5) Images of jelly fish -> BBC Planet Earth, Deep Wonders.
6) Images of hammerhead shark -> BBC Planet Earth, Shallow Seas.
7) Images of microbes, microscopic life -> BBC Life / BBC Inside the Human Body.
8) Images of the sunrise over earth -> Images from the International Space Station as it orbits the earth.
9) Images of a galaxy -> Hubble deep field, some random spiral galaxy image.

What else is there? NOTHING. Absolutely nothing else in this film. Some weird kids. Some rolling in the grass, ABSOLUTELY NO DIALOG. How dare you use images that deserve credit on their OWN merit, and came from others, in your film in order to garner credit for YOURSELF!? Unless there was some connection to it in the film? Or a need for it?

Its not fair! Anyone can just put in some bits of imagery from space, some bit of imagery from the BBC's Planet Earth, some bit of imagery from a microscopic biology textbook, some weirdo kids and call it a movie.

Absolutely pathetic, disgraceful, shameful!

PS*/FYI* Hey, Mallick, do you even know how those Nebula images are photographed? Hey? Do you even know which electromagnetic spectrum they're in? Do you even know what individual filters they used before they could color those nebula images? Bet you don't.

What's beautiful about this movie? The visuals? The interstellar space imagery? Where did those images come from to begin with? Is it Mallick's imagination and creativity you think? You think he came up with those visuals? Pathetic. They're just a bunch of images from NASA's Hubble, from the BBC's documentaries. Copied as-is and thrown there into his excuse of a film just to make it look 'awe'. And they have NOTHING to do with the story of the film themselves. Just a wastage of reel and minutes.

I could make a movie about weirdos, some kids running around in the grass, and oh yea, include images from Hubble, WISE, SOHO, Spitzer, Chandra, Kepler and whatever space telescopes I can get my hands on. That's it. Done. Movie finished. Goodbye.

THANK GOD THIS MOVIE MADE A LOSS AT THE BOX OFFICE. THANK GOD! JUSTICE SERVED.

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James, though you come off as too much of a douche, thank you for this post. While, admittedly, I could not pinpoint the source of all the visual material when I watched the film, I realized most of it was probably not original. So it doesn't surprise me that none of it was.

To those defending the film makers: there's a difference between creating your own material referencing another's as inspiration and just using another's source material. If you're OK with the latter, cool. I'm not and it sounds like the OP isn't so we'll just have to disagree there.

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So you think that the director should have built his own "Mt. Palomar" just so he can say that he shot the entire film?? Why not just give credit to the sources of the footage (like one does in a well-researched science textbook)?

~~Bayowolf
There's a difference between being frank... and being dick.

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Three things...

First, it doesn't matter where the visuals came from or if they fit into any proper pattern. It is still a visually stunning film.

Secondly, and this may be more important... there are many decaf coffees out there that taste just as good as the real thing. Along with this, energy drinks are not a good thing. They can cause people to get really edgy and lose it a little. Stay away from them.

You may also weigh the option of moving to Colorado. Recent laws may help you.


If the plural of mouse is mice, and the plural of goose is geese, why is the plural of moose not meese?

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First, it doesn't matter where the visuals came from or if they fit into any proper pattern. It is still a visually stunning film.


Completely true.

What an idiotic OP. Wouldn't you just love to take that guy mountain climbing or skydiving or coral reef snorkeling?

This guy would spend the whole trip explaining why you SHOULDN'T enjoy the views. I'm sure his explanation would be very scientific.

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Actually, I don't know that I would want to do anything at all with this guy as your last statement is probably true and I would end up punching him in the head after about ten minutes of being extremely annoyed. LOL.


If the plural of mouse is mice, and the plural of goose is geese, why is the plural of moose not meese?

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You may also weigh the option of moving to Colorado. Recent laws may help you.
LMFAO!!

Where's the "Like" button???

~~Bayowolf
There's a difference between being frank... and being dick.

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FWIW - the director licensed some of the footage and he had the cooperation of some of the leading scientists and wildlife photographers in the field. Terrence Malick and his associates never went on record claiming the footage used is unique to the film. Also, how many ways can you photograph stars, nebula and the sun and make it look any different from other pre-existing photos? It will never change its appearance in our lifetimes, or even the lifetime of all humans from the dawn of our existence until to our most certain extinction.

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[deleted]

To the original poster. Seldom have I seen the rantings of someone so lacking in spirituality, so spectacularly missing the point, the very essence of it's art. I weep for you and your pragmatism.

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And come to think of it, it's a uniquely schizophrenic statement in the thread title to begin with: studying science will diminish the beauty of images in a motion picture.

That's right.



"facts are stupid things" - Ronald Reagan

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It's just insane rant. What bothers me here, is the fact that basically anyone has the right to call anything visually impressive, if he or she feels that way.

There doesn't have to be a consensus about it. Every experience is subjective. Especially when it involves art. Even if it doesn't, I mean, if someone makes a hamburger, and it looks better than hamburgers in general, just like in advertisement pics, and thinks "Wow this hamburger is visually impressive", then it's his right.

OP just replaces god with science, in the sense that his god the science has the final word in defining what can be visually impressive and what can't. Himself, he presents as a messiah of scientific god with his "high IQ".

Still he misses the point, that Malick, who studied philosophy, probably uses existing imagery to connect this movie and it's imagery and message. It's a discussion between these things.

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Your posts repeatedly bring up the idea of you besting people in logical arguments. Do you even understand what the subject of logic is? Have you ever taken a logic class. If you have then surely you have heard of the fallacy of resorting to name calling rather than responding to another's arguments. You repeatedly employ this fallacy on this thread instead of responding to the points that others make. Anyone who has studied and understood logic at even a rudimentary level would know that resorting to this fallacy automatically causes you to lose any argument. No one needs to even engage you in further logical debate or discourse because you yourself have already forfeited the match by committing logical suicide. I suggest you follow your own advice, and take more classes.

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Enjoyable trolling, insecurejames.

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