I may not have been entirely won over, but I certainly was wowed!

Rating: 9/10 (4 December 2006)

May be a ways down from perfection, but with such an ambitious project, that's more than understandable, as well as forgivable. It's a poetic, impressionistic mood piece on the desperation of man to escape death, told over three intermingled, interrelated stories, one of a Spanish conquistador, one of a modern experimental doctor and the final of a man in the distant future, hurdling through space. I don't quite like what Aronofsky's solution is, that death is a new version of life. As an atheist, I have a more existential dilemma when it comes to death, and Aronofsky's new-age-y thoughts on the subject are no more helpful than Christianity's. I may disagree with the film's thesis in part, but what I cannot disagree with is how outstanding a film it is. I would take it over almost any other film released this year, certainly most of the best reviewed ones Â– it honestly kicks The Queen's ass. It looks and feels, and even sounds like almost no other film I've seen. The visuals are absolutely astounding (and done without an ounce of CGI, so they have a uniqueness to them). Even the non-sci-fi or historical parts have extremely beautiful visuals. The musical score, by Clint Mansell, is easily the best work of the year. The film really does engulf you in its remarkable aura, like the bubble in which Hugh Jackson travels through space. And the theme of trying to reverse a loved one's mortality is always a powerful one, and something that will stand the test of time. My prediction is, although this seems to be a colossal financial failure on first release, that The Fountain will become a favorite of a lot of people as time moves on.