The Tree of Life (film)

The Tree of Life is a 2011 American experimental drama film written and directed by Terrence Malick and starring Brad Pitt, Sean Penn, and Jessica Chastain. The film chronicles the origins and meaning of life by way of a middle-aged man's childhood memories of his family living in 1950s Texas, interspersed with imagery of the origins of the universe and the inception of life on Earth.

After several years in development and missing 2009 and 2010 release dates, The Tree of Life premiered in competition at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival, where it won the Palme d'Or. It ranked no. 1 on review aggregator Metacritic's "Top Ten List of 2011", and in January 2012 was nominated for three Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Cinematography.

Although early reviews for The Tree of Life were polarized, many critics and scholars have since declared the film a masterpiece. In the 2012 Sight & Sound critics' poll, 16 critics, including Roger Ebert, voted it one of the ten greatest films of all time; this placed it at no. 102 in the final list (making it the third film on the list which had been released since the year 2000, behind Wong Kar-wai's In the Mood for Love and David Lynch's Mulholland Drive). The film also received five votes in the directors' poll (placing it at no. 132), and in 2015, the BBC listed it one of the 100 greatest American films ever made.