Knight of Cups (Terrence Malick, 2016)

[ivuernis]

I don't see Malick inventing a new language, I just see a film-maker who is further lapsing into self-parody and I'm perfectly fine with films which lack traditional narrative or structure. There is a reason why Malick's critical stock has dropped sharply and it's because his box of tricks has played itself out and his films lack substance. The trailer for this sets off nothing but alarm bells, clumsily lurching from one trite cliche (visually and thematically) to the next.

Having seen the film at a festival recently I'm inclined to agree. I'll watch it again when it comes out on Blu, and maybe I'll re-evaluate it, but on first viewing I think it may even be a poorer film than To the Wonder. For all the beautiful photography there's a lack of depth/feeling to it. I'm not expecting the next film, the still untitled one, to be much better but I'll still happily go to see it. However, it's hard to see where Malick can go after that then (the Voyage of Time documentary excepted), if he wants to, and can get funding which I imagine after this glut of recent under-performing films will not be easy.

[Trees]

I expect the new Gosling film will go farther and deeper into this new, almost non-verbal style we've seen in WONDER and KNIGHT. VOT should have a much clearer and more linear narrative. In fact, very clear and linear. If VOT does well, it could help him raise funding for more pictures.

[Lost Highway]

I expect the new Gosling film will go farther and deeper into this new, almost non-verbal style we've seen in WONDER and KNIGHT. VOT should have a much clearer and more linear narrative. In fact, very clear and linear. If VOT does well, it could help him raise funding for more pictures.

Just looked it up and it apparently is a musical drama (shot in 2012) with Patti Smith among others, so it will have a bit of verbal, even if it's sung. I don't expect Hedwig and the Angry Inch, but I'm glad to see that he appears to take a different tack with his next one.

Malick's have never been the most chatty of films, so it's not like what he does now is that different, he just seems to be reducing his films down to the essence of his style. To me that's not that interesting because it's not just that he has been doing the whispy, ethereal, magic hour thing since the 70s, it's become an indie movie affectation for lots of film-makers who replicate the style to varying degrees of success. So he needs to move on and show that he has more in him than his imitators.

[AK]

I expect the new Gosling film will go farther and deeper into this new, almost non-verbal style we've seen in WONDER and KNIGHT. VOT should have a much clearer and more linear narrative. In fact, very clear and linear. If VOT does well, it could help him raise funding for more pictures.

Just looked it up and it apparently is a musical drama (shot in 2012) with Patti Smith among others, so it will have a bit of verbal, even if it's sung. I don't expect Hedwig and the Angry Inch, but I'm glad to see that he appears to take a different tack with his next one.

Malick's have never been the most chatty of films, so it's not like what he does now is that different, he just seems to be reducing his films down to the essence of his style. To me that's not that interesting because it's not just that he has been doing the whispy, ethereal, magic hour thing since the 70s, it's become an indie movie affectation for lots of film-makers who replicate the style to varying degrees of success. So he needs to move on and show that he has more in him than his imitators.

Although yours is a very commendable analysis of what you find to be wrong with his cinema, I can't subscribe to that last sentiment (I utterly love Malick's films, btw). I feel he's gone down a decidedly personal path and, although it might seem he's merely repeating himself and his old tropes so that it can be interpreted as aimless self-parody, I actually find him to be one of the most focused directors out there, to the point that his films obsessively approach the challenge I find to be at the very center, that is, how to cinematically recreate emotion and memory that in the same time cannot be trusted because if its subjectivity but still can be identified with, or even more, embraced. Memories, doubts, might have beens - this is what I get from his films, and for me he is constantly moving forward/inward.

His films where there, alongside Tarkovsky's, when film really got to me, so I've certainly invested a great deal in his films, and feel like I get loads back. That's why I have lots of patience for him, certainly more than I have for others even if I tried.

[Lost Highway]

I expect the new Gosling film will go farther and deeper into this new, almost non-verbal style we've seen in WONDER and KNIGHT. VOT should have a much clearer and more linear narrative. In fact, very clear and linear. If VOT does well, it could help him raise funding for more pictures.

Just looked it up and it apparently is a musical drama (shot in 2012) with Patti Smith among others, so it will have a bit of verbal, even if it's sung. I don't expect Hedwig and the Angry Inch, but I'm glad to see that he appears to take a different tack with his next one.

Malick's have never been the most chatty of films, so it's not like what he does now is that different, he just seems to be reducing his films down to the essence of his style. To me that's not that interesting because it's not just that he has been doing the whispy, ethereal, magic hour thing since the 70s, it's become an indie movie affectation for lots of film-makers who replicate the style to varying degrees of success. So he needs to move on and show that he has more in him than his imitators.

Although yours is a very commendable analysis of what you find to be wrong with his cinema, I can't subscribe to that last sentiment (I utterly love Malick's films, btw). I feel he's gone down a decidedly personal path and, although it might seem he's merely repeating himself and his old tropes so that it can be interpreted as aimless self-parody, I actually find him to be one of the most focused directors out there, to the point that his films obsessively approach the challenge I find to be at the very center, that is, how to cinematically recreate emotion and memory that in the same time cannot be trusted because if its subjectivity but still can be identified with, or even more, embraced. Memories, doubts, might have beens - this is what I get from his films, and for me he is constantly moving forward/inward.

His films where there, alongside Tarkovsky's, when film really got to me, so I've certainly invested a great deal in his films, and feel like I get loads back. That's why I have lots of patience for him, certainly more than I have for others even if I tried.

I guess you are right and my problem is that I don't connect with what's inside Malick and his spiritual/religious/philosophical sensibilities and concerns. That's why I like his two first films the best, because they weren't about him. One was a true crime story and the other one a lose adaptation of Henry James' Wings of the Dove (moved to the US and with the genders reversed). I loved The Thin Red Line when it came out, but I have cooled on it a little since and I wished the original theatrical cut of The New World was available because I find it superior to the director's cut available on Blu-ray.

[Trees]

It would be nice if the theatrical cut of THE NEW WORLD was available on blu-ray.

[Luke M]

This weirdly enough reminded me of the TV series Entourage. Malick's vision of Hollywood lacks any kind of originality, far from creating its own universe of Los Angeles like so many filmmakers have done. It's just generic.

I do hope this is the last film in an autobiographical trilogy. They've all been misses. With every announcement of a new Malick film, I hold out hope for another Badlands or at least another New World. But that seems so long ago.

[carmilla mircalla]

I really want to say, after watching this that I am completely done with Malick but I'm still holding out for the Gosling/Mara movie simply because of its two main stars.

[Finch]

I found the film fascinating and atmospheric in parts but also very mannered, more so perhaps than To The Wonder. The fragmented style was very taxing after a while, to the point that I found this the hardest Malick film to sit through, and I love his earlier work up to and including The Tree of Life. Might revisit this sometime but I'm among those hoping the Mara/Gosling film will resonate with me.

[MagicHour]

The German BluRay arrived on Friday; I can report that it has its' own UK menu, no forced subs, and the transfer looks stunning. Extras include pretty much most of the Berlin Press conference, some Red Carpet interviews and a short featurette.

[ermylaw]

Criterion tweeted a poster for this film today. I'm not sure whether that means they'll release it. But, if they do, you can thank me for contributing to the release by purchasing the German blu-ray.

[FrauBlucher]

It's a beautiful poster. I've asked several times, on Twitter, how this will be released for home media. They have not responded. Their site hardly indicates physical media, but does for streaming and VOD.

[aox]

I found this to be one the most difficult narrative films I have ever seen. Full disclosure: I adored To the Wonder and have watched it many times. I didn't like Tree of Life, but it was beautiful, well acted, compelling from a narrative standpoint, and conceptually great (the universe story). This film wasn't even beautiful IMO. The cinematography couldn't even make LA anything more than a sterile shell of concrete. I have seen plenty of films that manage to make LA beautiful and this one didn't. My main complaint with Malick over the years has always been that I thought he would have been a better photographer than filmmaker; this film even rejects that notion for me. That might be the point, but regardless, I found this film to be unpleasant in almost every way.

I'm now 2/7 with Malick (Days of Heaven and To the Wonder)*. I can't say I am excited to see anything he does again.

*I'd be willing to give Badlands another shot since it's been 20 years. I just remember not liking the third act.

[domino harvey]

The German BluRay arrived on Friday; I can report that it has its' own UK menu, no forced subs, and the transfer looks stunning. Extras include pretty much most of the Berlin Press conference, some Red Carpet interviews and a short featurette.

You can pick this up for around $20 total shipped to the states FYI

[mfunk9786]

aox, your ratio makes me really want to see To the Wonder. I still like Badlands on the whole though I do zone out once the third act begins (and I think that counts as having issues with it) and I've disliked everything else aside from Days of Heaven. Would be interesting to poke around and see if we have the same brain.

[Vlogler]

I appreciate To the Wonder because Malick strips off a lot of the pretty, period piece and/or nostalgia coats he lays onto his other movies, with a contemporary setting and less show off-y pretty shots. It sounds like he's continuing that with Knight of Cups, so we'll see if there's anything left without that element.

[thirtyframesasecond]

I really love Days of Heaven (and we're talking favourite films here). Liked The New World quite a bit. Been a while since I've seen Badlands/The Thin Red Line but liked them enough at the time. Tree of Life was half amazement/half "whaaaa". Not particularly interested in anything Malick makes these days.

[solaris72]

Is the German blu region locked?

[felipe]

I found this to be one the most difficult narrative films I have ever seen. Full disclosure: I adored To the Wonder and have watched it many times. I didn't like Tree of Life, but it was beautiful, well acted, compelling from a narrative standpoint, and conceptually great (the universe story). This film wasn't even beautiful IMO. The cinematography couldn't even make LA anything more than a sterile shell of concrete.

Agree with you there. Malick's films are always so beautiful, and this one is definitely not.

[Oedipax]

Boy do I strongly disagree with that. I found this to be one of Malick's best looking, most visually arresting films, right down to the 'crude' GoPro sections, which made me think of later Godard - Adieu au langage, Éloge de l'amour - as well as Korine circa Spring Breakers. I think the use of crude digital is a lot more successful here than the occasional stabs of it in To the Wonder. To put it succinctly, I found Knight of Cups, on a visual level, a superior rendering of Los Angeles to that of Mann's LA-set films. I think especially the shots of architecture benefit tremendously from the scale of large screen projection rather than TV viewing. I was fortunate enough to see the film once theatrically in Germany and now a handful of times on the bluray - and while the bluray transfer is very nice, something is definitely lost in not seeing things huge.

[John Cope]

Yeah, I can't comprehend these responses either. I've seen the film several times now and, though it often has the quite appropriate effect of lulling one into a near hypnotic state, I am continually awed and overwhelmed by the beauty of it on a consistent, shot-by-shot basis. Going through it each time now I find myself quietly holding my breath in anticipation of certain shots and sequences (e.g. the cityscape passed along the L.A. freeway at night, the illuminated open car park ("Nobody cares about reality anymore."), the shot of Bale leaning in to kiss Pinto against a briefly comprehended flat background of artfully rendered "observers", the entire club scene with the sound from the club dropped out or muted and the images transformed into strange unknowns, etc.). As far as I'm concerned it's among Malick's most rapturously gorgeous films with a sheer river of stunning shots and sequences (which do function finally subconsciously as we are indeed lulled by the preponderance of the beauty, its free flowing quality in arrangement and the often infinitesimal time each image appears on screen); there is, as usual, a constant flow of movement to the entire film in which all details are caught up and eddied around. The details function as expressions of an artistic vision struggling with fragments (even the voice overs are more fragmentary than ever), construing the beauty of models and superficial gloss as shadow guides for the transcendent beauty of an ultimate reality. All of this is fitting too as the film is deeply concerned with the nature of beauty, what constitutes it and how it is received. It's equally concerned with aesthetics and artifice as a means of expression, how and why it is "authentic" or "real", in what way it may be meaningful. On a foundational level, the film is also about challenging us--our very sympathies, receptivity, understanding.

Malick manages to finally and fully attain the cinematic headspace of pure, undiluted stream of consciousness and reverie to which he has long been striving; story, dialogue and character are indeed stripped down to a bare minimum, an essence; picture could not be much more abstract without the characters losing any semblance of character at all. And this too is a prominent tension: between notions of what is "real" and the abstractions of artifice--Malick is well aware of the ironies and makes use of them, builds on them throughout. The ecstatic sheen of it all is a crucial part of the film's philosophical and intellectual ruminations; it's folded in upon all the other themes, intertwined, inextricable (the tensions between the unavoidably solipsist artist/human and larger reality is central, paramount, a guiding concern).

It's just so incredibly rich. It is, however, about a very, very particular kind of struggle, one to which I'm not sure most can relate. It's also a film of remarkable clarity and directness; all of its themes and what would otherwise be subtext are right there on the surface as is fitting in a film so much about surfaces. The difficulty and profundity of the picture lies on another, more subtle and less visible level, in the implications of all those directly related and stated themes. The ending still does confound and mystify though (as it did in To the Wonder), as is also perhaps utterly appropriate for the kind of resolution and release that it is.

[aox]

aox, your ratio makes me really want to see To the Wonder. I still like Badlands on the whole though I do zone out once the third act begins (and I think that counts as having issues with it) and I've disliked everything else aside from Days of Heaven. Would be interesting to poke around and see if we have the same brain.

Most definitely. Let me add a caveat though: I watched To the Wonder with very rosy glasses because it was shot almost entirely in my home state of Oklahoma. Oklahoma is not a place you generally see in movies. Additionally, IMO Oklahoma is a very ugly state for the most part, so I was also excited to see if Malick could make it beautiful. IMO, he succeeded. Aside from that, I think it is a great film all around and utilized this new film grammar that Malick has created (Tree of Life, To the Wonder, Knight of Cups) the best.

[ermylaw]

I watched the German blu-ray this weekend. Technically, the blu-ray is outstanding, so if you're keen to get this film, you should not worry about that version.

As for the film, I thought it was brilliant. The narrative style was quite interesting in that you essentially have a main character around whom people revolve -- he's like the deserts we often see in the film. He is vacuous -- people come into his life for a brief time and then go away again. More specifically, since this is a man looking for fulfillment (perhaps in having a successful marriage and children), various women enter his life and then leave just as randomly as they appeared. When the main character is done with these people, we see them carrying on at the edge of the ocean, staring off into the horizon. I took this as a continuation of the visuals from Tree of Life -- it is as if the main character is ushering these people away from himself and into oblivion, their lives without him.

The only recurring secondary characters that we find are the main character's father and brother, who turn up to argue. But they cannot be consigned to oblivion as easily as the many women who come and go. Does his family push him forward or hold him back? The narration we hear from the father seems to be at odds with the father character that we see.

The purpose of the film is to show a man who has fulfilled every monetary and career goal but still feels a complete emptiness in himself, I think the film is a great success. Still more, there are lavish parties with any number of other people who could've just as easily substituted in for our main character -- they also live empty lives and are searching for true fulfillment. It is worth noting that the main character is only named once, perhaps so that he can more easily stand in for any number of other people carrying on the same search as himself.

There is certainly more to be said about this film. I thought it was more cohesive in its narrative than To the Wonder. I found it to be rather focused on using its form to present its theme, and it is beautiful to watch.

[MagicHour]

Is the German blu region locked?

Yes it is.

[bradass]

There will be no special arrangement for Knight of Cups and it will be released by Broad Green Pictures.