Aronofsky's 'Fountain' overflows with ideas, leaves viewers awestruck
>>Print ViewPublication Date: 11/30/2006
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Darren Aronofsky's "The Fountain" is confusing, unevenly paced, practically inaccessible and just plain weird.
It's also the best film I've seen all year.
"The Fountain" weaves together three narrative threads spanning a thousand years to create a fascinating meditation on death and the fundamentally human desire to escape it. Each element of Aronofsky's cinematic triptych tells the same basic story: A man (Hugh Jackman) seeks the Tree of Life in order to live forever with the woman he loves (Rachel Weisz).
In the present, the story is that of a researcher, Tommy, desperately searching for a cure for his wife, Izzi, who is afflicted with a terminal brain tumor. An experiment with part of a rare Central American tree leads to miraculous results - results that can't come quickly enough. Though she returns Tommy's immortal devotion, Izzi comes to terms with her impending death, inspired by the Mayan legend of a golden nebula, Xibalba, as the afterworld. It is this legend that prompts her to write a book, also titled "The Fountain," whose story provides another of the film's three threads.
The book tells of a Spanish conquistador, Tomas, who travels to the New World for his queen, Isabelle. Surrounded by terror and strife in the midst of the Inquisition, Tomas tells his queen of his willingness to die for her protection. Isabelle's desire is quite the opposite; she wants him to find the Tree of Life so that they both may live forever. The quest leads to a temple deep in the jungle, where a flaming sword-wielding guardian hisses, "Death is the road to awe."
The third and most fantastic narrative takes place in the 26th century, in which Tommy, now a bald, tattooed yogic figure, floats through space in a giant bubble. Accompanying him are the Tree of Life and the ghost, or maybe just the memory, of Izzi. He is traveling to Xibalba in the hopes of an eternal reunion with his lost love.
What makes "The Fountain" so intriguing, though, is the interplay between these three threads. None of the stories is complete in itself; rather, making sense of each requires consideration of the substantial symbolism, dialogue and visual motifs from the other two. Take, for example, a shot of the hair on Izzi's neck standing on end from Tommy's breath. That this seemingly throwaway detail is emphasized seems strange until the image reappears significantly in another of the three narratives.
The totality of this triptych doesn't so much tell a single story as explore the very idea of death and our reaction to it. This exploration follows two fundamentally opposed conceptions of death: Tommy's, that "death is a disease" to be cured and prevented, and Izzi's, that death can be seen as "an act of creation," a sort of transcendent ecstasy. In the climax, these ideas converge in a resplendent cosmic explosion.
Visually, "The Fountain" is stunning. Each shot is painstakingly and artfully framed to convey the film's visual motifs. The special effects during Tommy's ascent into Xibalba are exceptional, as a translucent bubble containing an ancient tree is set against a golden nebula.
The music doesn't disappoint, either. Composer Clint Mansell and the Kronos Quartet, whose jarring strings thematically enhanced Aronofsky's "Requiem for a Dream," return accompanied by Scottish post-rockers Mogwai. The resulting score combines the quartet's exquisite string work with Mogwai's slow crescendos and rock-inspired timbre; its long build-ups to dramatic flourishes neatly parallel the film.
Still, "The Fountain" isn't for everyone. It's about as far from popcorn fare as wide theatrical releases get; this is a weird artsy movie for people who like weird artsy movies. Its pace varies widely, and its abrupt shifts between threads can become confusing. Many viewers will be turned off by a movie that makes little to no sense until near the end - and that even then requires a number of leaps on the viewer's part. Others may find its message muddled or its ambition overreaching.
"The Fountain" never exactly answers the questions it prompts; it just explores them as fully as it can within its 96 minutes, leaving the audience to piece together the rest. As far as I'm concerned, that's its greatest strength. "The Fountain" sets viewers on the road to awe.