Rumpus columnist Nicholas Rombes explores the “Occupy zeitgeist” in 2011 cinema over at Filmmaker. Rombes reveals how films such as Drive, Meek’s Cutoff, Martha Marcy May Marlene, and Tree of Life, while seemingly “far removed” from the movement, “speak to Occupy anxieties of this past year.”
“…It’s possible that films like Tree of Life somehow capture — in their very structure — the decentralized fantasy of the movement. All four films… are defined by lack. In each one, it’s not clear precisely what the protagonists want, although they each clearly want something, and this generates a sort of outsized tension, a puzzle for the audience that somehow makes us complicit.”
