Tree of Life ((2011; directed by Terrence Malick): Malick’s film is the only one I know in which the origin of the universe, and of life is rendered in visual poetry. What he pulls off here is creating a feeling for the universe, its immensity, and our very place in it. And not only that, it manages to assign a role to the universe, for lack of a better word, in the plot of the movie. The film is neither science education, nor nature documentary, though nature figures in almost every frame. It is, in part, a story of an ordinary, though troubled family in Texas in the 1950s. The movie alternates between a point of view of their life that takes for granted their historical and cultural milieu, recognizably American but also far enough to be recognizably “periodâ€, and the timeless perspective of the cosmos and nature. The subplot of the movie is the interplay between the two. [recommended by Katalin Balog, Rutgers University]