Malick Goes to IMAX
Thursday, June 30, 2016 at 6:08PM 
Leave it to Terrence Malick to always keep us guessing when his next film will drop. Recently we got word that his long-rumored documentary Voyage of Time would finally be dropping this fall and on massive IMAX screens to boot - before the star filled Weightless that he shot back-to-back with this year's Knight of Cups. Like his movies, I guess the release schedules and post-production meander as well.
But even without Weightless's star power, Voyage will pack wattage of its own. Ennio Morricone will be scoring the film, reuniting him with the director after almost forty years since they collaborated on Days of Heaven. And there may not be recognizable faces on screen among the eyepopping visuals, but Brad Pitt narrates (Cate Blanchett is set to narrate the extended, non-IMAX version that is also rumored).
If you have your doubts about another Mallick meditation on existance, consider that this version will be running at a swift forty minutes. Without a narrative to distract from the auteur's transfixing visuals (albeit this time without Emmanuel Lubezki behind the camera), this one should give us precisely what we want from him without the frustrations of his recent work. Check out the just released trailer and imagine it on a huge IMAX screen:
Voyage of Time opens in IMAX on October 7. What other Mallick film would you see in IMAX?
Reader Comments (12)
I think Kubrick did this one first...
Frustration of his recent work? I am not frustrated at all.
I'm not frustrated over his recent work either. In fact, I enjoy them as I will definitely see this.
I'll be there on opening day (for both versions).
Shouldn't Brad Pitt be whispering his narration?
It seems like the worst film of all time.
It seems a lot like the BBC series Blue Planet to me, just shorter and slightly more pompous.
Nothing frustrating about the man's recent work. It's beautiful, transporting, poetic and sure to be rediscovered in future years. Much more frustrating are the drones who judge his films based purely on their RT scores.
I love Terry's recent work (well, I love Tree and Wonder, like Knight). Either way-I'll see anything with his name on it. I'm there.
Just a reminder that in Knight of Cups Cate Blanchett managed to surprise me in the most organic way possible. I saw zero of her usual acting choices and that's entirely because of Terrence Mallick and the way he directs.
When a director manages to pull an entirely different acting style out of a legend, he must be appreciated and complimented for it even if the film is half-baked.
Now give me a Weightless trailer already!
I agree with most of the commenters above. Malick continues to deliver exactly what I've always wanted from him: gorgeous, boundary-pushing, increasingly post-narrative cinema. Someone's gotta do it. The medium has to evolve somehow. But I've always been a big fan, so I'm clearly biased. If anything, I'm disappointed at a 40 minute run time.
I'd rather watch Terrence Malick meander than many of the directors feted by the Academy and American awards groups and critics over the last 25 years.