Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on August 2013

It is unlikely that Terrence Malik’s latest comment on the Human Condition will sway either his fans or his detractors. It’s a love story, kind of, of love found and lost, and how passions change with time. As with most of the auteur’s films, there are sequences of pure poetry, but this can be a slog if you go in expecting conventional filmmaking. It’s best approached as a gorgeous, moving art collage, allowing the impressionistic images to wash over you. There’s little dialogue, nor much of a story, really. I’m glad I saw it; it made me think. But the director is walking the cusp of self-parody.