10 Most Divisive Films Of All Time

Ever since his exceptional, dreamlike debut Badlands, Terence Malick has moved further and further away from conventional narrative structure towards something akin to visual poetry. His on-screen dialogue became increasingly sparse, replaced by ephemeral voice overs reflecting the internal turmoil of his characters.

The Tree Of Life represented the pinnacle of this approach, telling the story (or rather showing the memories) of a man reflecting on his childhood in 1950s Texas in a visual style closer to Expressionistic paintings than standard filmmaking. Understandably, this approach is more subjective in its interpretation than most, and the divided opinion on the film reflects this clearly.

Fans and critics alike were completely split, the former admiring his dreamlike imagery and loose structure, intent on showing the disjointed nature of memory and pleased to see Malick break completely free into a new kind of cinematic form. Others were "bored, bored, bored" by what they saw as a pretentious mess, urging people to avoid this "pointless crap" like the plague.

Depending on where you sit on this binary spectrum, the three hour cut recently released on blu-ray is either a treasure to be cherished or a new form of torture.