Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		1.0
Overall		2.0

The Sea of Trees Blu-ray Movie Review

Going down for the third time.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman October 30, 2016

Maybe just a little unbelievably if not downright shockingly (at least for those of us still unaccustomed to the sheer amount of data available on the internet), there are actual lists (in abundance) on the world wide web documenting the most popular places around the globe to commit suicide. At or near the top of the list on several such aggregations is Aokigahara Forest, a sylvan glade at the foot of Mt. Fuji which has evidently been a preferred spot for Japanese folks (and others) to end their lives. This beautiful and yet inherently spooky place was the location of this year’s recent horror entry The Forest, and it’s once again a focal point of reference in a somewhat more lyrical and introspective film, Gus Van Sant’s The Sea of Trees. Van Sant is an interesting director if not always a consistent one, and both of those aspects are on display in this film, one which wants to weave together a kind of supernaturally tinged tale of an American traveling to Aokigahara to “do the deed,” with a more nuts and bolts deconstruction of a marriage under a number of stresses. The result is fitfully engaging, and the film has a rare elegiac quality which is quite notable, but as an organic whole it probably fails in both narrative and presentational elements. The film begins with Arthur Brennan (Matthew McConaughey) driving to an airport. When he leaves his keys in the ignition and tells the check in clerk he has no baggage for a flight to Japan, suspicions are already on the rise, even without the foreknowledge of what’s on Brennan’s mind. A brief scene in Tokyo seems to suggest Brennan is adrift in a sea of people, not trees, but he then drives to Aokigahara, where he proceeds into a forbidden area and is greeted with scenes that could have been lifted out of a Tobe Hooper film (evidently the clean up crew at the forest is a little behind on their duties). Brennan settles into a gorgeous scene with breezes flitting evocatively through the trees and begins to swallow a handful of pills. A ha. Suddenly in the distance he sees a completely bedraggled, disheveled and downright bloody Japanese man stumbling through the forest, sobbing uncontrollably. In a moment that probably plays at least a little better than it sounds in recounting, Brennan immediately forgets the “task at hand” to go to offer aid to this individual. Already The Sea of Trees is on tenuous narrative footing, at least from a believability standpoint, and unfortunately things only get worse as they go along.

The man Brennan comes to the aid of is a badly injured (both by himself and the elements) man named Takumi Nakamura (Ken Watanabe), and already this film’s kind of quasi-Twilight Zone ambience is in full flower (no pun intended, given this film’s prevalence of foliage imagery). Is Takumi a real live human being or some kind of spectral entity? The Sea of Trees pretends to be ambiguous about this, at least for a little while, but nevertheless not really adequately obfuscating what is an undeniable metaphysical bent to Chris Sparling’s screenplay. Weirdly, this supernatural element is forced to cohabitate with extended flashback sequences detailing Brennan’s faltering marriage with Joan (Naomi Watts), segments which play kind of like a B-movie version of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, at least that is until things tip over into maudlin melodrama with a “disease of the week” approach that might have been lifted whole cloth from any given Lifetime made for television movie.

While the backstory between Brennan and Joan provides supposed emotional context for Brennan’s current roiling psyche, the forest sequences begin to get into a survivalist mode that started to rather humorously remind me of a similar gambit in Swiss Army Man, to the point that I began wondering when Takumi might give in to a resounding fit of flatulence. The film isn’t just bifurcated, therefore, it’s virtually trifurcated, with too many detours to ever find an exit route (again, no pun intended, given the screenplay’s artifice that the forest has “no exit”).

Some high falutin’ philosophizing intrudes in the film’s final act, with an emphasis on spirituality that some may find downright hilarious, what with hoary conceits like angel messages being delivered on fragrant breezes and the like. The Sea of Trees met with almost uniformly negative reviews upon its theatrical release (including by our very own Brian Orndorf), and I can certainly understand the disparagement. That said, there’s a strange majesty to some of Van Sant’s framings in the film, with cinematographer Kasper Tuxen wending in and out of the forest seemingly like a leaf blown on one of the breezes that are so frequently shown. The film’s gorgeous score by Mason Bates is another standout, and there’s no arguing that McConaughey and Watts bring more than sufficient star power to the film. But this is one outing that is simply too diffused to ever deliver any potent message, despite its all too ardent attempts to salve the wound of loss that virtually everyone suffers at some point in their lives.

Note: For Van Sant fans wanting to catch one of his earliest credits, check out this clip on YouTube for a proposed series that was filmed in Portland in the early eighties. Gus was the grip on the shoot and a certain reviewer with the initials JMK provided the score.

The Sea of Trees Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Sea of Trees is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.40:1. The film's closing credits mention the Red Epic Dragon, but the IMDb also lists the Arri Alexa XT, so one way or the other this was digitally captured and then (again according to the IMDb) finished at a 2K DI. There are a few contrast issues at play at various points throughout this presentation, with a bit of digital murk creeping into several dark sequences in the forest, but generally speaking, this is a sharp and well defined offering, one that offers superb levels of fine detail in many extreme close-ups (see screenshots 1, 4 and 6 for a few notable examples). A lot of the forest footage is graded slightly greenish and/or blue, and detail levels can minimally decrease as a result, especially in midrange shots. The flashbacks are more normally lit, and offer a somewhat warmer palette that emphasizes yellows and browns and which generally offer excellent detail levels. Despite the frequent darkness of the forest scenes, there's really no noise or other distractions to speak of.

The Sea of Trees Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Sea of Trees' DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track is a wash of great surround effects, at least in the forest sequences, where constant breezes waft through the side and rear channels and help create a really evocative, haunting atmosphere. The aforementioned elegiac score also resides quite comfortably in the surrounds and helps to create a bit of the emotional ambience that the actual screenplay isn't ever really able to. While somewhat more subdued, the flashbacks have moments of decent immersion, as in an early party scene where Joan has a bit too much to drink. Dialogue is presented cleanly and clearly and there are no problems of any kind to report.

The Sea of Trees Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• The Sea of Trees: A Story of Beauty and Tragedy (1080p; 8:17), is a pretty standard EPK, though it contains a few interesting interviews, including some with McConaughey, Watts and Van Sant at Cannes, where the film was evidently not very well received.

The Sea of Trees Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Gus Van Sant is one of the most distinctive directors in contemporary cinema, but he seems to stumble a bit more dramatically than some others in his generation. The Sea of Trees is definitely a stumble, but I'm not willing to completely discard it, despite its obvious deficits. Fans of the cast may well want to check this out, with an understanding that dramatically the film is all over the place and its commendable message of salvation kind of gets lost in the morass. For those who are considering a purchase, technical merits are strong.