The terrence malick appreciation page1. The concept of world
Malick is known to have had an interest in the concept of World in Heidegger's work. His thesis proposal at Oxford concerned the relationship between this concept in the work of Heidegger, Wittgenstein and Kierkegaard, however he did not go on to complete. Instead, one might argue, he made Badlands, which appears to develop this concept into the story of Kit and Holly's wandering rampage. The "World" argues Heidegger, is the background of assumptions a social group share about what is right, wrong, normal and abnormal, and which consequently serves to coordinate the behaviour and responses to behaviour in that group. In 20th century literature, the archetypal "Outsider" - such as Meursault in Camus' L'Etranger, or Gregor in Kafka's Metamorphosis - is someone who does not "fit into" this background of shared assumptions, but stands, as it were, outside of the world. Kit and Holly seem to be at the edge of the world, not least because of the way they behave towards others (shooting them) but also because they are apparently profoundly alienated from their social landscape; the discord between who Kit and Holly think they are, as opposed to who they actually are, is the source of some the ironical humour, and sense of danger, in Baldands.
2. Philosophical Moods
Heidegger's unorthodox conception of Philosophy, or of "philosophising", has strong resonances with Malick's approach to film-making. Heidegger believes that the world reveals itself to us primarily through our moods and emotions, not our thoughts, which are merely derivative of the latter. Malick's films search for and develop moods both vast and expansive, as well as ephemeral and delicate; the intricate over-lapping and interplay of the moods comrpises a film-making style which is perhaps closer in style to a piece of music than to a novel or drama.
3. Being and beings
Heidegger believed that the ground of Philosophy was in the concept of Being - perhaps un-graspable because it is the ground, but it can always be gestured towards, evoked, and perhaps importantly for Malick, shown to look back towards us. All beings, that is, all living things, participate in Being. We are dealing here with a metaphor which should not be taken excessively literally, however, the fundamental suggestion that there is a shared unity which can either be disclosed or concealed from us is a driving concept in Malick's cinematography and stories. Stanley Cavell, for instance, has remarked on Malick's filming style that he has found a way to show the photographed object's participation in its own photographing, that is, we are reminded of the thing-in-itself in the image, and not of a generic 'tree,' 'bush,' or 'bird' as in less sophisticated cinematography. We are reminded therefore of the uniqueness of the thing filmed, before it has even acquired a name. The least one could say then, is that Malick has found a way to convey cinematographically the central notion of Heideggarian philosophy: that of Being and how individual beings do or may relate to it.
4. Unhomeliness
Heidegger has said of human beings that what may fundamentally define "humanness" is the sense of not being at home, of unhomeliness (umheimlich.) Unhomeliness is perhaps the central preocuupation of existentialism; the question of how to be, given the freedom to be many ways, none of which seem to afford the satisfaction of feeling at home. Meursailt in Camus' L'Etranger rejects the "way of being" of the world around him, and finds himself lost in an undefined, amoral drift through which he ultimately finds his end. Kit's story in Badlands may unfold according to a similar pattern, although his reaction to the angst of not knowing who to be is to adopt a make-believe identity, (which Heidegger calls inauthenticity.) The great majority of Malick's characters are in some respect or other, unhomely, both psychologically and literally. Kit and Holly live in their car and in a tree house, the characters in the beginning of The Thin Red Line live amongst a Melanesian tribal village, and the family in Days of Heaven sleep in haystacks in harvest fields. Malicks characters are not at home - the search for such Home, or the transient feeling that we may have been there, are central preoccupations in all four films. The resolution of The Thin Red Line could be compared to Wittgenstein's dissolution of the"problem of life" in his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus in which he declares "I am my world" - the distinction between Private Witt and the world seems to collapse as he transcends at the moment of his death.
5. Buddhism
It has been claimed that Malick has had an interest in Buddhism. Some of the voice-overs in the later films (The Thin Red Line and The New World) contain and suggest concepts of Eastern mysticism, such as the idea that there is profound, timeless unity between all living beings. One could also point to the brooding, meditative style of Malick's cinematography, which attempts to break out of thought into direction consciousness of the thing itself, before it has acquired its identity. There is here a similarity with the Buddhist philosophy of mind and metaphysics, as found in the practice of Zen meditation.
6. Catholicism
Malick is probably a Catholic, and is at least known to have a thorough working knowledge of the Bible. The film Days of Heaven is based on the Book of Ruth. Furthermore, every Malick film explores the myth of the fall from paradise: in the outset, there is a sense of living in an ideal world, but it is revealed to be a dream; the character's fall and attempt to re-interpret their world culminates into a spiritual synthesis in the three later films.
7. Trascendentalism
Many of the voice-overs, as well as the pantheistic doctrine that the Divine is immanent in all living things are the convictions are Malick's hallmarks, and found in the American transcendentalist poets and writers such as Emerson (On Self-Reliance,) Thoreau (Walden,) and Wallace Stevens (Harmonium). The majority of these poets explore the possibility of the perception of God in nature (and therefore a belief in its holiness, at odds with Orthodox Christian doctrine), and also emphasise the importance of the individual as a self-reliant, self-made agent responsible for his own existence, and knowing himself fundamentally as related to a transcendental centre found in solitude.
8. The role of the poet in destitute times
Malick's films can be interpreted as performing the function of the poet in destitute times, according to Heidegger. Destitute times, he wrote, are those in which we loose touch with Being. In a sense, we forget who we are, and abstract away from our essence. The poet, accordingly, must remind us of what we have left behind: his poetry is a lyricial expression of Being, as it must be understood as arising organically from the direct intuition of Being, and so bringing us back once again. Watching Malick's films certainly conveys the impression that he has this sort of interest: to evoke, through the moods of his films, a sense of returning.