Moving Toward a More Inclusive Model
Even though African Americans and women have worked toward, and in some cases succeeded in, destroying the veil of the binary, no true examples of a alternative system have been proffered. In order to affect change, it is essential for marginalized groups to present a system in which there is no “other,” one in which one group is not favored or privileged over another, and one in which individuals are celebrated for their contributions to society rather than their prescribed power within it for lasting change to occur. One theory to explain why these two groups, long oppressed by American society, have not affected change on the system in which they live is an insistence on using the oppressive patriarchal structure of print texts and as well as a compliance with the ways in which meaning is made in advertising to open up the existing societal relationships. However, there is one example of an artist, Terrence Malick, who has been able to provide a model not only because of the ways in which he approaches binary systems, but also because he uses media with characteristics and conventions that support the introduction of a new system. Malick’s outlook on the word was certainly affected by the influences of both his immigrant father and his American mother, and it maybe that those influences gave him a much wider foundation on which to build his theories and practices than an author or artist who was purely influenced by American culture. One distinct difference between the thematic elements explored by Malick is the fact that he does not protest a system that defines its members by class or race or gender but one characterized by the dualistic view of science and religion, and his views, hopefully, provide an example from which Americans can begin to create a more equitable racial and gender-neutral model.
Terrence Malick has created the most recent and intriguing example of this mixed media presentation that both collapses and reinvents a dualistic structure with the film, The Tree of Life, winner of the Cannes Film Festival’s Palm D’Or. Labeled “a colossal commercial…to sell us the hymn to life” (Cox), Malick has created a film that imitates both modern and ancient life while at the same time destroying the boundaries between religion and science by using a combination of narrative film and biocybernetic technology. Malick wrote and directed this stunning visual and aural text blending the narrative of a family of five with digitally created scenes of the microscopic and macroscopic natural world as it evolves from a tiny speck into what exists today.
In this fundamentally flawed family, both the father and the mother struggle to understand the ways in which the other relates to the world. The mother narrates the beginning of the story and sets up the dichotomy by positing that there exists “the way of nature and the way of grace, and you have to choose which one you’ll follow” (The Tree of Life). The father relies on progress and religion to influence his path and urges his sons to live with strength of character and independence while holding them to a higher standard than he holds himself. The mother feels connected to nature and wants her sons to find joy in the world through its simplicity but undermines the lessons she imparts upon her sons by failing to defend those beliefs. The storyline blends the story of biblical creation with the story of evolution both in content and technique, and it does so with every turn. In one example, Malick has chosen to weave visual effects that depict the world’s astrophysical and microbial realms together with nonsychronous sound of the mother talking to God thereby connecting man to nature in ways that that do not give man dominion over the earth but urge him accept its awesome force. But the true message of the film comes with as the oldest son strives to blend what he has been taught with what he has discovered is true in the world. The resolution for him is achieved in a dream sequence when all of his family members are reunited, even those he has lost, and he realizes that whether he accepts or rejects what he has learned from his life experiences or what he has been taught by his family, they will always love him, and he will not be able to resist his love for them. With this conclusion, Malick collapses the struggle between science and religion, and man and nature into a system that is ruled by a concurrent acknowledgement and acceptance of differences.
In addition to his ability to intricately weave science and religion, Malick has also chosen to represent the overarching theme of acceptance with media that “structure[s] [his] encounters” (Mitchell, 351) with the audience. The characteristics of biocybernetic technology are such that what the viewer sees is an “improvement or enhancement” (Mitchell, 320) of the conclusions reached by modern scientific research. Digitally created images in the film include the origins of the universe, the fiery beginnings of the earth, the evolution of animals on earth, the dinosaurs, and the ice age that killed the dinosaurs, and provide the viewer a more contextualized understanding of the ancient world of which this modern age is merely an infinitesimal part. By including these images, Malick seeks to provide a “rethinking of our condition in the perspective of deep time in order to produce a synthesis of the arts and sciences adequate to the challenges we face” (Mitchell, 324). Hopefully he has also created a model that can be used by future artists and authors to change the racial and gendered systems of the United States as well.
Terrence Malick has created the most recent and intriguing example of this mixed media presentation that both collapses and reinvents a dualistic structure with the film, The Tree of Life, winner of the Cannes Film Festival’s Palm D’Or. Labeled “a colossal commercial…to sell us the hymn to life” (Cox), Malick has created a film that imitates both modern and ancient life while at the same time destroying the boundaries between religion and science by using a combination of narrative film and biocybernetic technology. Malick wrote and directed this stunning visual and aural text blending the narrative of a family of five with digitally created scenes of the microscopic and macroscopic natural world as it evolves from a tiny speck into what exists today.
In this fundamentally flawed family, both the father and the mother struggle to understand the ways in which the other relates to the world. The mother narrates the beginning of the story and sets up the dichotomy by positing that there exists “the way of nature and the way of grace, and you have to choose which one you’ll follow” (The Tree of Life). The father relies on progress and religion to influence his path and urges his sons to live with strength of character and independence while holding them to a higher standard than he holds himself. The mother feels connected to nature and wants her sons to find joy in the world through its simplicity but undermines the lessons she imparts upon her sons by failing to defend those beliefs. The storyline blends the story of biblical creation with the story of evolution both in content and technique, and it does so with every turn. In one example, Malick has chosen to weave visual effects that depict the world’s astrophysical and microbial realms together with nonsychronous sound of the mother talking to God thereby connecting man to nature in ways that that do not give man dominion over the earth but urge him accept its awesome force. But the true message of the film comes with as the oldest son strives to blend what he has been taught with what he has discovered is true in the world. The resolution for him is achieved in a dream sequence when all of his family members are reunited, even those he has lost, and he realizes that whether he accepts or rejects what he has learned from his life experiences or what he has been taught by his family, they will always love him, and he will not be able to resist his love for them. With this conclusion, Malick collapses the struggle between science and religion, and man and nature into a system that is ruled by a concurrent acknowledgement and acceptance of differences.
In addition to his ability to intricately weave science and religion, Malick has also chosen to represent the overarching theme of acceptance with media that “structure[s] [his] encounters” (Mitchell, 351) with the audience. The characteristics of biocybernetic technology are such that what the viewer sees is an “improvement or enhancement” (Mitchell, 320) of the conclusions reached by modern scientific research. Digitally created images in the film include the origins of the universe, the fiery beginnings of the earth, the evolution of animals on earth, the dinosaurs, and the ice age that killed the dinosaurs, and provide the viewer a more contextualized understanding of the ancient world of which this modern age is merely an infinitesimal part. By including these images, Malick seeks to provide a “rethinking of our condition in the perspective of deep time in order to produce a synthesis of the arts and sciences adequate to the challenges we face” (Mitchell, 324). Hopefully he has also created a model that can be used by future artists and authors to change the racial and gendered systems of the United States as well.