Hammerman Ikon

Hammerman Ikon Film Guide

The Fountain
2006
**
Director: Darren Aronofsky
Cast: Hugh Jackman, Rachel Weisz, Ellen Burstyn, Mark Margolis, Stephen McHattie, Cliff Curtis, Sean Patrick Thomas

Three men, all of them played by Hugh Jackman, dream of spending eternity with the woman portrayed by Rachel Weisz. A 21st century neuroscientist tries to cure his wife, who has written a book about a 16th century conquistador who is commissioned by the Queen of Spain to locate the Tree of Life, which in the distant future is dying inside an orb and travelling in deep space with a Buddhist spaceman. Darren Aronofsky's long-cherished project, which he also scripted, could be summed up as 2001: A Love Story. The film is ambitious and visually arresting, and after a confounding start the three strands do come together, but the whole story is just a bunch of New Age hoeey. Although Jackman and Weisz are both good, their under-developed but over-played romance fails to touch the heart.