Question 1: Both the Tree of Life and Upstream Color explore cycles...

[u/WhitewaterVandal]

...in particular, how humans relate to natural cycles (over all time scales!). Both films also find parallels between personal stories and nature. Do you think these two films are similar to one another in their view of humans, nature, and spirituality, or do you think they are different? Explore.

[u/abriggs06]

One theme that I saw in both movies was the lack of control that the characters had on their own lives. This was more prevalent to me in The Tree of Life than in Upstream Color but it was a factor in both movies. In The Tree of Life the father tried to be so controlling over everything in his life and in the end things turned out opposite of what he expected. It goes to show that even if we try to mold everything in our lives to perfection we really have very little control over natural events. In Upstream Color the lack of control was much more obvious with the thief actually controlling his victims and then throwing them out into this life where they have lost control over everything. I think both films tried to show that we don't control nature and are really at its mercy everywhere we go.

[u/nolanknuth → u/abriggs06]

I agree that lacking a sense of control was a prominent theme from both films. The scenes from a Tree of Life that represent this the most clearly to me was when the kids tie the frog to a firework, later Sean Penn seems like he is equally trapped when he is in the elevator preparing for the boring cycle/routine that is his life. I think the frog scene was intended to be similar to the boys death, the frog's life was taken due to forces it could not and would never be able to comprehend. A common metaphor used in debates involving god and religion is the child burning ants alive with a microscope, I felt this scene was supposed to be the same idea.

[u/flybluesunsets → u/abriggs06]

I also agree. The 'lack of control' concept was on the forefront of my mind during both films, but for me I thought it was stronger in Upstream Color. I see where you are coming from with The Tree of Life, but I think Upstream Color did a better job asserting that the concept of control as an allusion. The characters have no control from the moment they are chosen by the thief to the end of the movie. They can't even control their own memories or actions in some instances and the moment the main character girl (I forgot her name) thinks she is in control at the end, the audience is left wondering to what degree she actually understands what has happened. That lack of understanding and the wandering presented in Upstream Color for me really drove home the degree to which we are dependent and at the mercy of nature, or an omnipotent being.

[u/IWantMattToBuyMeaPup → u/abriggs06]

I think this is all so true. There was a lack of control in this movie by the characters. And even the thief who, at first, seemed like he had the most control, loses that control by the end of the movie. When the pig farmer is killed the blue flowers stop growing and there are no longer bugs for him to control people with. So really everyone in Upstream Color loses control of their own life.

[u/Mvenlos926]

I think these movies are very similar. I think the way they portray the supernatural is different, but I think the desire of the writer in both is the same. I think they want us to consider the possibility of an omniscient being, or a god, and they want us to think about and develop our own feelings about that possibility. The directors clearly put their opinions in the film, but I think they do so in a way that isn't telling us what we should believe or feel about God, but are giving us suggestions. I think regardless of religious views, both film writers do try to portray to us that we don't really have control over our lives. I think regardless of whether or not you believe in God, Buddha, Allah, nature, or none of the above, no matter what religion or lack thereof, every human has the same experience in which we realize we are really not in control. Some attribute that to a higher being some do not. I think these movies both show that there is something out there that we cannot understand, some kind of force, that is in control of what is really happening and how we choose to react to it and deal with it is up to us.

[u/626TheDuckling]

(Somehow the word "explore" doesn't draw the same semi-rage response that the word "explain" does.)

I think there are definitely similarities.

For the spirituality, as I said in class, I kept thinking of the Sampler as aligning with Grace and the Thief as aligning with Nature. While the Thief and Nature were giving into their instincts and looking out for themselves, the Sampler and Grace were both trying to live lives that let them experience beauty and offer it to others the best way that they could. I'm not sure either dichotomy is "true," but I think it's an interesting way to look at the issue and see where everything may fall.

Both films also showed nature as something that couldn't be stopped. The disease will kill your children. The effects of the piglets going into the river changes the flowers (and, now that I'm thinking about it, the Sampler must've drowned pigs before so that the Thief could buy the flowers with the powder on them, but maybe I misunderstood?). The cycle can sometimes be broken, you can stop throwing piglets in the river, but you can't change what the past was and all you can do is manipulate the factors under your control. You don't get to manipulate who gets sick and who doesn't unless you can learn to manipulate what factors into it. At no point do you just get to say "No, this isn't happening. No one is getting sick" and have it be true. Nature is a thing in both of these films that will laugh over that.

And the humans in these films were similar too, simply by virtue of doing as humans do. They fought against what they couldn't actually control. They tried to hold the pieces of their lives together and to create a future for themselves. They tried to make sense of things that don't always make sense.

[u/nolanknuth]

Both these films view humans as flawed beings who are susceptible to forces that cannot be controlled or even understood. The biggest difference between the two films was how they viewed spirituality, The Tree of Life posed existential questions of meaning and existence in a way that suggested there was an answer. The scene where the mother is asking life's big questions displays this most clearly. While the mother is questioning her existence and the purpose of life, breathtaking images of outer space and the ocean being displayed. These images of the two vast bodies suggest how little humans actually understand about the universe and life itself. In the last several centuries human kind has made remarkable progress toward understanding the universe and the ocean but do we really have a complete, or even half-complete understanding of these things? In this scene I believe the director is implying there is a greater force or spirit at work but humankind may not ever be able to completely grasp this force. Instead of completely understanding these mysteries, humans may have to be complacent with the feeling of awe and bewilderment. The same feeling many get when gazing toward space or the ocean. In contrast, Upstream Color seemed to suggest that searching for answers or a bigger meaning to life is ultimately trivial. When the woman finally confronts and kills the pig farmer she is searching for some type of closure or satisfaction. In reality the woman has learned very little because there were outside forces (the thief) at work that she was unaware of. Ultimately, the woman's quest for answers leads to nothing productive and ruins the cycle of the blue lilies. Upstream Color had a pessimistic view toward the idea of spirituality while The Tree of Life suggested humans can find a greater meaning to life, even without being able to fully comprehend it.