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on those years
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living the life with someone I didn't
even know night of cups is the second
film of what I guess can be called
Terrence Malick's experimental trilogy
which also includes to the Wonder and
song to song all three of these films
are shot mostly without a script to
experiment with improvisation
metaphorical images and other
non-traditional ways of filmmaking
sometimes they just give me GoPro and
say oh go drive around there lay for a
little bit with one of the other actors
or by myself and just kind of film
things and do a scene if we feel like
doing a scene or no or go in the ocean
for a little bit and swim although the
results may seem off-putting and
pretentious to many
Malick did create a unique process and
vision which I believe deserves to be
explored in more detail like The Tree of
Life Malick is again concerned with
complicated existential themes and
explores these in knight of cups by
modeling its story after the hymn of the
pearl from the Acts of Thomas the hymn
of the pearl tells the tale of a prince
who was sent west into Egypt to find a
pearl but when he arrived the people
pardon the cup and the prince fell into
a deep sleep forgetting he was the son
of the king forgetting about the pearl
Malik uses this story as a metaphor for
losing oneself one sense of meaning of
purpose existential philosopher søren
Kierkegaard wrote in a similar way about
the danger of falling into this deep
sleep the greatest hazard of all losing
oneself can occur very quietly in the
world as if it were nothing at all no
other loss can occur so quietly any
other loss an arm a leg five dollars a
wife etc is sure to be noticed so let's
take a closer look at how Malick
explores this loss of self and the
subsequent quest for meaning that
follows it
in night of cups we follow Rick a
screenwriter trying to find meaning in
his life which especially in the
hedonistic world of Hollywood seems like
a hopeless pursuit Kierkegaard wrote
extensively about this fundamental
discomfort every human being experiences
when attempting to relate to the outside
world in search of meaning a despair
that according to him arises from the
self the self is seen by Kierkegaard not
as a noun but as a verb as that which
relates to the relation between the
finite and the infinite two opposites
that are present in all of us the finite
relates to the necessary consequences of
our limited being in a concrete reality
the infinite on the other hand relates
to the possible our ability to create
new thoughts and ideas to come up with
endless potential existential despair
arises when one relates to this relation
in an unbalanced way which happened to
Rick when he entered into the Hollywood
Life and found the world of the infinite
see the palm trees
they tell you anything is possible
you can be anything
do anything he turned into what
Kierkegaard would call the Aston a man
who has become hypersensitive to his
potential settling for nothing and only
chasing bass pleasures and the
momentarily interesting their life
flavours sometimes you want raspberry
then after a while you're the title babe
you want some strawberry like any other
addiction over stimulation like this
leads to boredom and ultimately
meaninglessness for it is not true
meaning he is chasing just the idea of
it as one character notes even to love
experience we also see this reflected in
the title of the film which refers to a
terror guard of the same name in
definition practices the knight of cups
God in Reverse like the film poster
insect symbolizes a similar type of
personality that is highly sensual and
desperate to feel good someone who has
lost a sense of meaning to end up stuck
between reality and fantasy he is
however not completely lost as the hem
of the pearl story continues the prince
received letters from his father the
king of the east to help him remember
who he was
Rick also receives these messages
throughout the film from characters he
encounters and other inciting event such
as the almost literal wake-up call from
an earthquake in the beginning of the
film that motivated him on his quest for
meaning represented here as the light on
top of the mountain
least trial Knight of cups is structured
by tarot cards that refer to the
different chapters of the film each one
hinting at what is going to happen such
as Rick being robbed in the chapter
named after the tower guard which
predicts a sudden upset what I think is
most important here is that the tarot
card chapters represents Rick's deeper
longing for meaning any kind of meaning
to give some sense of structure to his
fragmented life and avoid what he sees
as damnation I suppose that's what
damnation is the thesis of your life you
ever to come together this is again
reflected by the audience's search for
meaning in Malek's fragmented narrative
structure which was the inevitable
consequence of Malik's unscripted
approach in which even he didn't know
exactly what he was filming until he got
to the editing phase I personally see it
as a beautiful interconnectedness of the
narrative and the filmmaking process one
that comes much closer to touching on
real life that as Kierkegaard would say
this lifts forwards but can only be
understood backwards
Rick's longing for meaning is probably
most evident in his relations with women
in which he sees that which he himself
has lost when we see a beautiful woman
soul remembers the beauty it's used to
know in heaven as a consequence he seems
to place his existential burden on them
making them his source for existential
closure to the point of fetishizing them
which of course dooms his relations to
failure as they are finite reality or
more simply but the fact that these
women are just human beings can never
live up to what Rick wants them to be
and so his quest goes on but over the
course of the film it seems as if Rick
is making little progress instead of a
more linear progression towards some
form of climax Malick shows a seemingly
endless cycle falling in and out of love
falling asleep and waking back up even
though some encounters
seemed to provide a bit more Hope than
others based on the metaphorical desert
landscapes mattock frequently shows us
Rick is still stuck in the desert only
seeing reflections of the greater light
that continues to elude him how do I
begin
near the end of the film
Rick encounters a priest who points out
that Rick's suffering is exactly what
connects him to God or the infinite to
suffer binds you to something higher I
haven't known will takes from the word
to find what lies here again we see the
influence of Kierkegaard and his concept
of the self not as a stable entity but
as an act as an act one focuses on
relating oneself to the relation between
the finite and the infinite instead of
always chasing the infinite as something
to be grasped or contained this has also
been made popular by New Age power of
now type philosophies that focus on the
role of one's attitude towards the
outside world instead of one's
attachments to it for Kierkegaard's
reconciling this balance between the
finite and the infinite is the only way
out of despair this according to him is
done through faith but not in the
traditional sense that requires you to
be part of an organized religion or hold
on to an objective worldview that you
know is not true instead he speaks of
taking a leap of faith connecting to the
infinite by relating oneself absolutely
to a transcendent source transforming
love for other people into a love for
the eternal being that shines through
them and therefore not trying to achieve
the infinite in finite things
who mind on the ice above it
this is not an act based on logic or
reason which is exactly why it's called
a leap of faith it emphasizes the
importance of a subjective world view
rather than an objective one and
inversely an objective view towards
oneself rather than a subjective one by
making this leap the knight of cups
becomes the knight of faith a person who
according to Kierkegaard as someone who
outwardly is indistinguishable from the
crowd but inwardly is constantly making
this movement of infinity this relating
oneself to a higher source of the
infinite the knight of faith is however
a mostly hypothetical being for in
reality to be free from despair means
that this movement of faith must be made
continually on the strength of the
absurd a repetition that is almost
impossible to uphold continuously this
becomes clear at the end of the film and
Rick is seemingly happy and freed from
despair scaling the mountains towards
the light when suddenly he loves Exodus
starts playing again the song that
earlier introduced the aim of the Pearl
and Rick's falling asleep we see clouds
move into obscure the light pushing it
back to the horizon concluding with the
image of yet another journey towards the
elusive sunset accompanied by the single
words begin
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you
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