Movie Review: Knight of Cups
What We Liked
What We Didn't Like
Knight of Cups tells the story of a Hollywood screenwriter (Christian Bale) who laments his purpose in life. Strippers, parties, money, family dysfunction, the works. Each interaction he shares comes and goes with ghostly ease, stepping up to drop their two cents of disgruntlement before receding back into the evening’s debauchery. Vice and vulgarity become a source of addiction, a cocktail that goes down smooth and cauterizes the soul. If all this 
sounds obtuse and pretentious, that’s because director Terrence Malick goes out of his way to make it so. As a result, Knight of Cups is a soufflé that can’t go more than a few minutes without caving in on the viewer – a side effect of its stubborn house chef.
Malick has always been a tough cookie to crumble. From epics like Days of Heaven (1978) and The Thin Red Line (1998) to pensive pieces like The Tree of Life (2011) and To The Wonder (2012), his quest for artsy obscurity continues to outrank narrative normality. Such an approach has sparked polarizing reactions from both fans and critics, though this hasn’t stopped Malick from becoming the reclusive myth-maker of the Movie Brats; a J.D. Salinger of the cinema. Sadly, reputation alone can’t salvage Cups, the director’s weakest entry to date. The “script,” and I use the word loosely, is so riddled with fake deepness and existentialism that by the time the halfway mark is reached, musings on not wanting love, but “wanting an experience” become sophomoric attempts at capturing male misery. Even worse, the pointless Tarot card chapters that imply some larger rhyme or reason quickly turn this thing into a mental endurance test. One that mostly fails in earning its admission price – something similar in quality can be found on a well-written Tumblr post.
The miserable male in question, Mr. Bale, is spectacularly squandered as screenwriter Rick. Though his saddened optimism comes closest to giving Cups a thematic heart, the sheer lack of material is deafening to the actor’s nonchalant noise. Bale has since discussed in interviews that Malick would give other performers dialogue and force the Academy Award winner to improvise on the spot; a trick proven painfully uninspired in its final product. Instead of expanding his acting muscles, this avant-garde approach actually condenses Bale’s talent and does little to flesh out the wealthy womanizer. As such, Rick is righteously overshadowed whenever Wes Bentley, Brian Dennehy, or a spectacular Antonio Banderas drop in with old fashioned plot purpose. Cate Blanchett, Freida Pinto, and Natalie Portman also benefit from scripted necessity, but so little of it pans out that their interactions with Bale seem more like acting workshops than crumbling love affairs.
The only person that rises to this eye candy occasion is the film’s cinematographer, Emmanuel Lubezki. Fresh off a record setting three consecutive Oscars, the Mexican magician weaves a thousand thread count tapestry over Malick’s symbolism, and the results are downright exquisite. Integrating GoPro footage with Malickian trademarks (landscapes, nature), Emmanuel “El Chivo” conjures up a world of addictive decadence, landing somewhere in between Zen meditation and the sleaziest music video ever conceived. Unfortunately, this mood essay approach achieves far more in a trailer of two minutes than it does a film of two hours.
It all comes back to Malick. The bearded auteur simply indulges in the worst way imaginable, while demanding the awe that comes with quality content. In fact, he covers Knight of Cups in so many topless models and muttered musings that by story’s end, Rick’s quest (or distraction) of beauty feels cheaply exploitative by default. “Begin” is the final word uttered over a road heading nowhere, and it feels insultingly accurate given the cinematic tease that was just witnessed. Instead of a Terrence Malick marvel, viewers were gifted an Emmanuel Lubezki highlight reel hosted by Christian Bale. Lovely, but a big old disappointment nonetheless.
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