Only three films released since the year 2000 managed to make it onto British film magazine Sight and Sound's 2013 critics poll for best movie of all time - David Lynch's Mulholland Drive has already been discussed - another is Terrence Malick's divisive 2011 movie The Tree of Life. It's not hard to see why Malick's film caused such diverse reactions from audiences upon its release - wildly experimental and largely eschewing conventional narrative, for some it came across as little more than a self-indulgent exercise in pretentious naval-gazing. With the extended "creation" sequence it's understandable why some reacted this way, but The Tree of Life transforms into something truly marvellous to behold when viewed as the cinematic equivalent of the ambiguous nature of memory and how we recall our childhood. Whether or not you think Malick's fleeting, abstract approach is fully successful, there's no denying that it is one of the most visually mind-blowing and audacious movies ever made.
