'Tree of Life' Review

Check out Nick Pinkerton's review of 'The Tree of Life'. Nicely crafted yet seemingly effortless, his writing, about what others have called a difficult movie to review, is direct, unpretentious, perceptive, and persuasive. Here's a clip:

With his cosmic realism, Malick vividly remembers youth's intimate yet huge idea of God, and Tree's Genesis overture recalls the viewer to a child's awed first conception of the vastness beyond his circumscribed world. Thus prepared, you have fresh eyes to see suburbia as, yes, a miracle. Throughout Tree, the close touch of director of photography Emmanuel Lubezki's Steadicam brings forgotten childhood rites near: roughhousing, betrayals of confidence, the clandestine thrill of being alone in a strange house, a child's frank curiosity toward the diversity of off-limits human types—including town drunks, cripples, and the black boys at that barbecue.