After two internet-free weeks in the Italian countryside, I’m gradually sifting through recent film news and coming to the conclusion that I chose as good a fortnight as any to drop out of the world. (File “Cars 2” and “Transformers Trois” under Things That Can Wait; ditto the Oscar-motivated fang-sharpening of rival Glenn Close and Meryl Streep camps.)
The fact that I returned home days after “The Tree of Life” finally hit UK theaters, prompting a fresh gust of ooh-ing, aah-ing and arguing, only enhanced my sense that Terrence Malick’s arthouse blockbuster is the only true movie event of the summer thus far, so forgive me for making it the subject of yet another post, but I thought it was worth drawing attention to two unrelated snippets on the film.
Particularly welcome is this LA Times piece that delves into the film’s spectacular soundtrack — where Alexandre Desplat’s typically intelligent original contributions nonetheless take a back seat to the dense collage of interpolations of existing classical music that is customary for a Malick film.