Tree of Life

The Tree Of Life offers up some interesting commentaries on life in a post-WWII world.  The relationship between the husband and wife illustrates a stark contrast of gender-roles during this time.  The wife, portrayed as a very graceful, free-spirited being, is a much less-disciplined, yet seeminly more-secure spouse as compared to her husband, who cloaks his inadequacies in a stern personality with straight-edge mannerisms.  His ideas of success and "good-living"  have been instilled in him through the national attitude that embodied the sentiment of "hard work pays off."  I think this was a sentiment that was treated as simple formula, much different and less abstract than it is treated today.  That sort-of "keep your nose to the grindstone" mentality that kept people on paths that they wholeheartedly believed in, ultimately served, in this film, to give the working man a strong sense of pride.  This pride was faulty, and based upon a false-sense of absolutism.  It painted an image of success as black-and-white, avoiding the harsher truths that were in fact the reality.  Brad Pitt's character is the perfect example of how this national attitude affected the average providing-husband.  He felt a sense of superiority and pride that ultimately yielded consequence of a ahrsh relationship with his sons.  I think its interesting how Malick exposes the very many lines that were fixed between people when it came to emotion and respect and inter-familial relationships.