The New World

Malick's most recent film, screening in an extended director's cut never before seen in theaters, envisions the immortal romance of English explorer John Smith and teenaged "wild child" Pocahontas (echoes of Badlands). Arriving on the rugged shores of 17th-century America, a vast land seemingly unchanged in the previous five millennia, a band of English settlers are confronted with unforgiving wilderness and an intricate network of tribal cultures. Mutinous explorer Smith (Farrell) is quickly sacked by a Powhatan chief who spares his life only when his young daughter, Pocahontas (Kilcher), intervenes. Contrasting the disorder and desperation of the English settlement of Jamestown with the primal harmony Smith finds among the Powhatan; Malick crafts an epic ode to a paradise lost. As Smith's bond with Pocahontas intensifies, tensions spill over between the natives and their gun-toting visitors. Masterfully orchestrating dazzling battle scenes and moments of fleeting intimacy, interweaving the tumult of human activity with the visceral splendor of nature, Malick's new American classic is worthy of Whitman. "A new watermark… an American creation myth that re-contextualizes our past, present and future as fable, as opera, as verse. It is this era's 2001: A Space Odyssey—a musical-philosophical-pictorial charting of history's slipstream and the individual's role within it. It is nothing less than a generation-defining event."—Matt Zoller Seitz.
Bing Theater | $10 general admission. $7 museum members, seniors (62+), students with valid ID.

Extended Director's Cut | In Person: Jacqueline West