The Fountain depicts timeless connections
Photo courtesy Warner Brothers Pictures
Under the direction of Darren Aronofsky, Rachel Weisz stars alongside Hugh Jackman in The Fountain. The film follows three storylines, each set 500 years apart, beginning in the sixteenth century.
Exploring the meaning of life and death is a tough task, but a new sci-fi movie, The Fountain, manages to tackle it by interweaving three stories that take place in a ten century time span.
The Fountain, a new film by Darren Aronofsky that opens Nov. 22, surpasses his previous films in almost every way.
If the name Aronofsky fails to ring any bells, try the two other full-length films he has directed, Pi and Requiem for a Dream.
Though he has shown he possesses a talent for directing in his past films, the plot of The Fountain is difficult to describe on paper, as the visuals take control of the film and its direction.
Three parallel plot lines continue through the film, using the same two actors (Hugh Jackman and Rachel Weisz) to depict the parallels in all three stories. In the 16th century, a Spanish conquistador is sent to find the Tree of Life, granter of immortality.
In the year 2000, a surgeon attempts to find a cure to his wife's brain tumor, and in the 26th century, a man moves through space in his biosphere/spaceship with the Tree of Life.
Aronofsky moves the action deftly between the three time periods, using changes in the tone of his narrative to direct the changes in time.
These shifts often come quickly and unexpectedly, leading to the fusion of the three narratives as the film progresses. The initial direction of these parallels is, at first,unknown (an admitted intention of Aronofsky). He claims his goal was to throw the audience into the film, bewildered, and slowly develop the direction of the film as a whole.
Aronofsky was recently in town for a short question and answer session following a showing of his film.
He has been traveling around the country (and will continue to do so) to promote The Fountain.
Aronofsky fans will not be disappointed by the long awaited project, which temporarily shut down in 2003 when Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett walked away citing creative differences.
New fans may have a chance to discover him as well since the MPAA recently set a PG-13 rating for the film instead of the original R rating.With the birth of The Fountain, gone are the days of the steady-cam and hip-hop montages used heavily in Pi and Requiem.
The quick editing style of the previous films has been replaced by precise camera placement, facial close-ups, and swift tracking shots, giving this film much more sophistication and emotional power than its predecessors.
Aronofsky says that he had run the course with his style choices in Pi and Requiem for a Dream and felt that it was time for a change.
His progression as a filmmaker is on clear display and is veryexciting to see, especially in a day of increasingly vapid filmmaking.
The cinematography is breathtaking, the most spectacular being the space sequences. All of the space nebula formations were created by filming chemical reactions and microbial processes with a high-zoom camera and microscope.
Indeed, no computer generated images were used in the film whatsoever- a fact that makes the imagery seem more organic and plausible, particulary in the space travel sequences.
Aronofsky uses these transcendental images as backdrops for Jackman's progression through space, giving these scenes a perfect tone to underline the Mayan belief that the nebula was their underworld.
Aronofsky's meditation on death and rebirth approaches similar territory to 2001: A Space Odyssey, yet it reshapes the rumination in a new and exciting way.
Pay attention to the use of the book, not surprisingly titled "The Fountain", in the film as well as Rachel Weisz's soft prodding of Jackman to "finish it."
The shift between reality and thought is not extremely subtle, but I fear that most will have difficulty distinguishing what actually occurs and what does not. Still, Aronofsky's decision to leave most of the interpretation to the viewer is what makes The Fountain worth seeing.
Although you may leave with more questions than answers as the film jumps across ten centuries, you will be entertained into thinking.
The Fountain requires careful viewing, but those who pay attention will not go unrewarded.
The progression and maturation of Aronofsky's work is something to be both praised and exuberant about, for this film indicates we can continue to expect great things from him in the future.
Seeing the great struggle that Aronofsky had in completing this wonderful, yet obviously non-traditional film, we should all be so fortunate as to experience and support such a budding filmmaker.
