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Voyage of Time: Life's Journey

Voyage of Time: Life's Journey (2017)

March. 10,2017
|
6.5
|
PG-13
| Drama Documentary

A celebration of the universe, displaying the whole of time, from its start to its final collapse. This film examines all that occurred to prepare the world that stands before us now: science and spirit, birth and death, the grand cosmos and the minute life systems of our planet. (Wide release version with narration by Cate Blanchett.)

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NekoHomey
2017/03/10

Purely Joyful Movie!

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Steineded
2017/03/11

How sad is this?

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ActuallyGlimmer
2017/03/12

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

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Zlatica
2017/03/13

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

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sirindell
2017/03/14

Galadriel the Noldo, the oldest of all living Elves in Middle Earth, recounts the Music of the Ainur, the creation of Arda, and the subsequent fall of Melkor. All living things are contained in her speech, and the magical images she creates for us speak of her immense power and knowledge, bathing the experiencer in a divine light. Upon watching this, one may put to rest his burden and plight, and with renewed vigor come to see them as a simple stepping stone in the Voyage of Time. The Valar are not represented in their physical image, but as allegories. The coming of Iluvatar's children and the corruption of Morgoth is also told in a symbolic fashion, presented by a handful of adventurers who wake in the desert and are drawn to Morgoth without first possessing the eyes to see the Evil and Malice he brings. Those who understand what I'm saying will also understand the documentary, for it is Wisdom condensed into 90 minutes. If you do not see it, I can only say that you are well off your path, seeking entertainment and plot, instead of investing your heart and soul into a transcendental experience. Immersing yourself into the film is a prerequisite, and if you are too proud or too ignorant to do so, be as you are. You will also come to know the Abyss which lies beyond Arda. Of the Fourth Age, the Age of Men, nothing is spoken, for it is still shrouded in the fog of the Future, and Mandos would not speak of it - not even to Manwe. Still waiting for the Quenta Silmarillion, hope Malick jumps on to that next.

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dromasca
2017/03/15

One of the previous films of Terrence Malick , The Tree of Life included a long segment about the origins of the Universe. When I saw that movie it was not at all clear to me how that part was related to the rest of the story - a family saga developing around a complicated father - son relationship. Director Malick was so much in love with that part that he decided to abandon any fiction in his latest movie and focus on the cosmology story. The result is Voyage of Time: Life's Journey which is listed as a documentary, although I have a hard time sticking it into that category either. Documentaries have as goal educating, or making statements about history or society or nature. Here we seem to be closer to poetry or sophisticated video art. What counts eventually is not the category but the result.The film starts with CGI images of the birth of the Universe combined with cosmic video art based on images of the most remote (thus the earliest) galaxies taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. It continues with images that describe or reconstruct the birth of Earth, the appearance of water and life, the evolution of plants and animals, the cosmic events (like the asteroid that almost eradicated life on Earth and put an end to the dominance and very existence of the dinosaurs), the emergence of mankind and its evolution towards the mega-cities of today, with their human mosaic and social problems. Most of the images combine fabulous nature filming with computerized effects and they are great, the story telling is visually astounding and has its own logic. I would have loved the film to be only visuals. I would have even accepted the soundtrack although I am not great fan of the world music or Gregorian chants, not when used in New Age messaging. Unfortunately Malick decided to add a spoken commentary and I simply could not make any sense of it. Some incantations and frightened kid questions directed to an over-present Mother (Nature? a feminine God?) were repeated over and over. To be clear, I like and I understand poetry, I respect religious feelings and texts, but the spoken commentary was nothing of these. The fact that Cate Blanchett , an actress that I deeply admired borrowed her voice to read this text, did not help, it just made me mad because I feel that her huge talent was wasted here. The result is just boring, and I surprised myself almost napping despite the beauty on screen.OK. So Terrence Malick wanted hardly to make a film about the history of the Universe. A Film about Everything. The Film about Everything. Now that you made it, please, Mr. Malick , come back to making the films we loved you for, films like Days of Heaven and The Thin Red Line.

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perlani
2017/03/16

I rarely ever write reviews about movies, but this 40 minute IMAX movie was devoid of content. "My child...What's death?" "My child... What's perfection?" with Christian choir music in the backgroun is all that you'll get from the narration. The visuals don't make sense - slow shots of of swirling red and black clouds. This IMAX was dark, creepy and pointless. Even my 6 year old said "I learned nothing" about history or science in this movie.

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Hollywood Glee (Larry Gleeson)
2017/03/17

Viewed by Larry Gleeson during the 73rd Venice International Film Festival at the Sala Darsena Theater.Acclaimed director Terrence Malick (Tree of Life, The Thin Red Line, Badlands) is bringing to light consciousness of the universe and what it means to be a human being in the present moment in his latest production, Voyage of Time: Life's Journey, produced by Dede Gardner, Nicolas Gonda, Sarah Green, Bill Pohlad, Sophokles Tasioulis, Brad Pitt and Grant Hill. Paul Atkins served as the Cinematographer while Dan Glass handled special effects. Keith Fraase and Rahman Ali provided editing. Cate Blanchett narrated this version.Director Malick reached out to a Harvard Professor of Natural History and the author of Life On a Young Planet: The First Three Billion Years and Biology: How LIfe Works, Andrew Knoll, and said he wanted to make a picture about natural history and the cosmos grounded in science. Malick had long been an admirer of natural history films drawing inspiration from earlier films such as Cheese Mites, a 1903 landmark film by British cinema pioneer Charles Urban and zoologist Francis Martin Duncan, depicting the microbial world inside a piece of Stilton cheese, and George Melies' 1902 Le Voyage Dans La Lune. Knoll had seen Malick's recent film at the time, Badlands. Having enjoyed the film, Knoll agreed to be a part of it. Little did he know of Malick's appetite to thoroughly investigate and devour subjects and correlating theories.An ambitious project in the making for over two decades, Voyage runs the gamut of time from the first cells splitting and foraging their way in and through their vacuous environment to the land of the dinosaurs and Tyrannus Rex to the dawn of man up to today and into the future with sweeping visuals and spectacular effects sure to encapsulate and stimulate the mind's imagination of time and place.The result is a journey uncovering what shape and form time has given and what shape and form that time has taken. From the early Primordial III stars that ushered the first sparkles of light to the universe and the Tiktaalik fish that came out of the oceans to walk on land.Special Effects Supervisor Dan Glass provided wide-ranging special effects from an Austin, Texas photographic laboratory called Skunkworks, a techie and industry term connoting radical innovation in research and development in conjunction with a variety of scientists and artists who collaborated to give representation to abstract images. While chemical experiments were conducted, a myriad of liquids, solids, and gasses were filmed at high speeds to generate a spectrum of effects as the team produced an array of stunning images.In addition, sublime photographs from the Hubble Space Telescope, NASA's interplanetary space probes, the Solar Dynamic Observatory - a satellite observing the sun, as well as adapted supercomputer simulations and electron-microscopy are added to the production's visual cornucopia of images.Long time cinematographer Paul Atkins was charged with assembling a series of forest and desertscapes as well as seascapes to provide backdrop for the computer generated imagery of long-lost species. To provide contrast and to remind viewers of the ebb and flow of existence - and its future- , contemporary images of humankind were collected from lo-fi Harinezumi cameras Malick handed out to people across the globe that produced warm and fuzzy, colorful images.Sound designer Joel Dougherty created and meshed in natural and speculative sounds of the universe. Meanwhile, Music Supervisor Lauren Mikus working closely with Malick selected instrumental pieces to evoke the swirling, swelling and creative energy at both ends of the magnitude scale.To watch Voyage of Time is a journey unto itself. Malick tells his story in a non-linear fashion allowing the viewer to create meaning from what's being shown and from what's being seen. The film opens with an establishing shot of clouds and blue skies. The shot is juxtaposed with a cut to a dystopian futurist refugee camp with fires burning. Then, a jump is made to what appears to be plasma. Cate Blanchett's voice-over begins with a soothing quality as she vocalizes, "Light giver. Light bringer. Who are you?" Blanchett continues with some pretty heady questioning throughout the rest of the film's narrative:"What brought me here? Where are you leading me? Who am I to you? Will we always be together? Where are you? Mother, does your goodness never fail? Will you abandon me? Did love make me?" If you like stunning visuals and mind-boggling questions, I would hallucinate that this is a film for you. Recommended.Voyage of Time will be released in two differing formats. One a 90-minute poetic foray full of open questions narrated by Cate Blanchett and the second a 45-minute giant screen adventure for all ages narrated by Brad Pitt.

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