As discussed in Parts 1, 2, and 3 of this series, The Tree of Life it is built around a dialectic between nature, represented by Jack’s father, and Grace, represented by his mother.
When using a Hegelian dialectic to structure your script, it’s important to remember that your characters are more than the ideas they represent. They are also people, complete with complexities, contradictions, and competing motivations that have nothing to do with their dialectical makeup.
In the big lebowskiThe Dude may represent the hippy thesis, but he’s also a character who loves White Russians and bowling, and spends most of his time chasing one of these things.
In there will be blood Daniel may represent capitalism, but he’s also a character desperate for a family connection and someone he can trust. Even Darth Vadar loves his son and secretly wants to overthrow the Emperor and rule the galaxy with him.
Character and Dialectic
Instead of looking at the structural role your character plays in your dialectical structure, you can think of the ideas your characters represent as a kind of lodestar, something to navigate as you build their choices.
If you spend all your time looking at the sky, you’ll spend most of your time bumping into trees. But if you keep an eye on your character’s instinctive path and allow yourself to remember that North Star is there to guide you when you need it, that dialectical insight will help you discover the deepest possible structure for your character’s journey.
Grace and Nature
What makes both the father and the mother work so well as characters in the The Tree of Life is that in addition to representing the dialectical opposites of Grace and Nature, both love their children more than anything in the world and want to protect them from suffering.
The problem is that they have opposing views on how to do this, and in good Hegelian fashion, neither of their views works in-universe.
The nature thesis
The father believes that the Nature of the world is violent and destructive, and he is right. And that’s why he wants to make his children tough, so that others don’t trample them, so that they can express themselves as artists, control their own destinies, and not have to compromise like he did.
We’ve seen these kinds of characters before in movies like billy elliott, The return Y a prophet– in fact, there’s even an archetypal name for him: the terrible father.
But the character of Brad Pitt is more than an archetype or an intellectual thesis. And that’s what makes her care about him and keeps her from being a cliché. Unlike the terrible parents we’ve seen in the past who want to stifle their children’s artistic expression, Brad Pitt’s character just wants to encourage it. He loves his children, embraces his children. He is loyal to his wife and makes sacrifices for his family. His tough nature is the pole star he navigates by. But it is not the only reason for his existence.
The problem with the Father Thesis is that it ultimately does not protect him, his family, or his children. Instead of winning the love of his son, his lessons in nature only destroy the beauty of his and Jack’s family, turn his sons against him, tear apart their marriage and pit brother against brother. .
For all his toughness, he can’t protect his patents from the courts, himself from losing a job, or his children from suffering. And his anger at his failures only manifests itself in more violence against the people he loves the most.
The antithesis of grace
In dialectical opposition to the father’s beliefs, the mother inherently believes that the world is beautiful. And she is also right. That’s why she wants to play happily with her children at all times, to love everyone and everything. That is why she brings joy and bliss into her lives and her genuine love for each other.
But his grace does not ultimately protect anyone either. Because she cannot face her husband, nor defend her children from her violence. When Young Jack accuses her in a moment of anger, she lets her husband walk all over her and all over them. Her love cannot protect her children from suffering or death. And for that failure, instead of earning Jack’s love, she only earns his wrath.
Stay tuned for the latest article in the series, in which I’ll discuss how dialectical structure creates a drumbeat for Malick’s fragmented narrative, and ways you can apply these lessons to the structure of your own screenplays.