Review ‘The Fountain’
I caught an early screening of Darren Aronofsky’s third, much delayed and much talked about (Brad Pitt, 70 million bucks, 2002, Australia, tits up) esoteric sci-fi realist love-poem The Fountain recently. Pi and Requiem for a Dream are both great, stimulating cult classics and the idea of this guy making a big-budget Mayan/present/future epic about the tree of life had me foaming at the mouth for (literally) years. The first trailer was fantastic (see below) but early word on it was that it was a mess and extremely hard to love. I chatted to a few people that had seen it and I was fascinated because I couldn’t work out how I might respond to it when I saw it. That was until one writer I really respect told me that although flawed, I’d definitely get into it. He said it had lots to offer, and even though it’s slow and not commercial it’s a very cool, stoner love story.
And he was right. It’s very trippy and as you’d expect it generally looks great and is very confidently directed. The three time periods are cut together in a stimulating way and although it’s a bit of a head fuck (and one or two moments are too earnest) the story (man seeks tree of life to save dying wife in three time periods) is weirdly simple. It works because he never fully explains everything (2001 style) so you are left hanging in a good way.
That said, it is a slow film and a huge shame that his planned MASSIVE Mayan battle was cut out (due to budget and Lord of the Rings doing it first). The small, brief battle is great and the film would have worked a lot more, and worked for many more people, if he had left in some of that scale and energy. If you like his other films get stoned and go and see it. I look forward to seeing which of his next two projects he goes with (one small and one HUGE).
Check out the trailer here
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