Terrence Malick is Working on A Longer Cut of ‘To the Wonder’

Here’s The Film Stage reporting on a potential new Malick cut coming our way.

Around the time of The Way of the Wind‘s production, two “rather reliable sources” told TFS that Terrence Malick had been editing a longer cut of 2012’s “To the Wonder,” much like he did with the extended versions for “Tree of Life” and “The New World.”

This new cut would potentially integrate “footage from Eugene Edwards’ adjacent docufiction “Thy Kingdom Come”. The problem is that Malick consumed a fair amount of his time on this one, with sadly all workflow “later derailed by COVID”.

He’s since shot a new film (“The Way of the Wind”) and has been editing it these past four years. Maybe, and if, he does premiere it at Cannes next year, which is the rumor, Malick might go back to working on the extended “To the Wonder.”

“To the Wonder” was the first film of Malick’s career to have been met with lukewarm reviews. Malick's direction was, as always, excellent and Emanuel Lubezki's cinematography sumptuous, though the story itself rang hollow, at least as far I’m concerned.

The film, which starred Ben Affleck and Olga Kurylenko, finally settled with a 48% rotten score and 58 on Metacritic. Malick’s following two films (“Knight of Cups” and “Song to Song”) were also not that well-received by critics. Many believe he had an artistic comeback, of sorts, with 2019’s “A Hidden Life.”

I connect “To the Wonder” more towards it being the final film Roger Ebert reviewed before his death. He gave it 3.5 stars out of 4. Also, Richard Brody (him again) proclaimed it to be the best film of 2013. It has its fans, a cultish bunch, but they are far and few. Hopefully Malick’s new cut vastly improves upon the original.