3. The Tree of Life (2011)
You can't really avoid "trying too hard" when you're tackling subjects as complex as life, death, relationships, time and, say, the history of the universe, which is what Terrence Malick did when he made his return from obscurity with his ambitious, Kubrick-esque movie The Tree of Life. Here's a flick that divided (and continues to divide) pretty much everyone who laid eyes upon it, but for my money - and as a Malick fan - the movie tries so hard to encompass so much that it falls flat. That's not to say that it doesn't have its good points, because it certainly does. The Tree of Life is, undeniably, a visually stunning and wholly interesting work of filmmaking, primed to provoke debates and inspiring intellectual discussions. But doesn't it all feel a little too self-conscious this time around, in ways that other Malick movies don't? Despite its narrative lulls, the movie is a treat for the eyes, of course, but the ambiguous nature of the story, and Malick's loose, freewheeling style are - though appealing in bursts - eventually fall onto the irritating side of things. There's no denying the man's ambition, but given the way that the movie sets out to be about "everything," it feels like there's too much going on. And at the same time, far too little.