Harrison Tweed (Top Dawg)
This is not a documentary, but one of my better screen savers lol.Yes, stunning visuals, but a documentary is meant to be informative and educational, and this is neither.The narrating (when present) is annoying. But, very stunning visuals.When I have a cocktail party at my home, this is my backdrop visual on my 65" screen and it's awesome! Of course the volume is off and I have elevator music playing from my stereo and the combined effect is perfect (you're welcome)!-5 for the docu, +5 for the visuals = 5/10 score
alexandercradcliffe
Based on how it was promoted I walk into this expecting a short documentary providing a quick tour of the history of the universe, while this is obviously a large topic there are meaningful things that can be said about it in 45 minutes. (e.g. the sort of content that you'd see in the first lecture of an intro pale course, with very brief coverage of big bang, first gen starts and stellar formation at the beginning).What the movie actually turned out to be was a lot of mysticism wrapped up in a scientific veneer. It repeated asked questions and then invited people to wonder at the open-question rather than attempting to answer the question (or even get the audience to answer the question it was clear that it really wanted to be about spirituality but also wanted to look like a legitimate documentary). This was even the case with questions that many first or second year students would have little trouble answering.It also routinely miss placed images in the chronology it was covering (e.g. talking about pre-Permian cephalopods but showing pictures of cuddlefish, showing iron enriched sedimentary deposits before talking about oxygenation etc...) Still gave it two starts at the photography and CGI was good even if it was sub-par in most other ways.
Jugu Abraham
Disappointing work from Malick, who I admired so much in "The Thin Red Line", "Days of Heaven" and "The tree of life." The only saving grace in this work -- great choice of music as in all Malick films, mostly Arvo Part and Beethoven. I prefer Godfrey Reggio's "Qatsi trilogy" to this Malick venture. Even Kubrick surpassed Malick in the early man depictions in "2001--A space odyssey" compared to Malick in this film. The editing in this film and in "Song to Song" is incredibly pedestrian.
darren-153-890810
I think I'm finally Malicked out.Yes, the cinematography is simply stunning, the score, editing and special effects are also brilliant, especially the use of fluids, the colours are amazing.However, using Cate Blanchetts annoying voice doesn't add anything to the film at all. In fact, it makes it feel like that stupid perfume ad when she keeps saying Si to me. Brad Pitt would have been a much better choice, especially as he was one of the producers.I'm not really sure where Malick can go from here. I know this has taken 20 years to make, I think he just collected footage during the breaks on set.Maybe the next film will be the Life of an Ant, where we follow an Ant around for 2 hours with someone equally annoying speaking on behalf of that ant
AD
