I'll be the first to admit that clearly, I didn't get it. Although to be completely honest, I'm not sure that there was anything to get. Song to Song is an incredibly simple story wrapped into an incredibly complicated and meaningless shell.
This was my first time watching a Malick film, so maybe it is true that I just didn't get it. But the more I think about it, the more convinced I am that there is nothing to get. It's a film filled with shots of nothing. Shots that linger for far too long revealing nothing that wasn't already revealed. Shots that are supposedly filled with meaning but come off as nothing but pretentious. And it's these shots that make the movie so incredibly slow. So slow, in fact, that I ended up checking twice how much was still left.
But it's not just the lack of substance that I found troubling. It's also the fact that this is such a simple story that is being told in an unnecessarily complicated way. It's a story of lovers who get mixed up in various relationships only to realise with whom they really belong. It's a story that's been told endless times in endless ways. Somehow, though, Song to Song manages to take that story and turn it into what I can only describe as a bunch of nothing. I didn't care about the characters, I didn't care about the story, nor did I care about anything else. I didn't even care about Ryan Gosling, who I would consider to be my favourite actor.
In a way, I have to give credit to Malick for creating something as meaningless as this. To be able to make a two-hour movie filled with a whole bunch of nothing is remarkable in and of its self. But, as I said, maybe I just didn't get it. Maybe this really is the masterpiece that so many people consider it to be. But luckily we don't all have to like the same things, because I sincerely hope that I never have to watch Song to Song again.
This was my first time watching a Malick film, so maybe it is true that I just didn't get it. But the more I think about it, the more convinced I am that there is nothing to get. It's a film filled with shots of nothing. Shots that linger for far too long revealing nothing that wasn't already revealed. Shots that are supposedly filled with meaning but come off as nothing but pretentious. And it's these shots that make the movie so incredibly slow. So slow, in fact, that I ended up checking twice how much was still left.
But it's not just the lack of substance that I found troubling. It's also the fact that this is such a simple story that is being told in an unnecessarily complicated way. It's a story of lovers who get mixed up in various relationships only to realise with whom they really belong. It's a story that's been told endless times in endless ways. Somehow, though, Song to Song manages to take that story and turn it into what I can only describe as a bunch of nothing. I didn't care about the characters, I didn't care about the story, nor did I care about anything else. I didn't even care about Ryan Gosling, who I would consider to be my favourite actor.
In a way, I have to give credit to Malick for creating something as meaningless as this. To be able to make a two-hour movie filled with a whole bunch of nothing is remarkable in and of its self. But, as I said, maybe I just didn't get it. Maybe this really is the masterpiece that so many people consider it to be. But luckily we don't all have to like the same things, because I sincerely hope that I never have to watch Song to Song again.