“We lived in utter loneliness, neither here nor there”

These words are spoken by Holly (Sissy Spacek), as she watches her boyfriend, Kit Carruthers (Martin Sheen) stand in the wilderness just outside South Dakota, in quiet contemplation. We find ourselves, like the characters, in the rural regions of the Southern United States sometime in the 1950s, a simpler time, but not one without its own individual challenges. Over the past few weeks, the pair at the core of the film has been on the run from the law. He was a garbage man who lost his job, she was a high school student who fell for his bewitching charms. They embark on a killing spree, starting with Holly’s own father (Warren Oates), and spreading to everyone who is unlucky to cross paths with the trigger-happy Kit, who is more than willing to put a bullet through anyone who gets on his wrong side or even dares challenge him in any way. In the midst this violence, the duo are falling even more deeply in love, with the young and impressionable Holly refusing to abandon a man she knows is extremely dangerous, solely because she is so enamoured with him, believing that below the sociopathic tendencies lies a tender heart. Yet, the law can’t evade them forever, which both of them know for a fact, and which they embrace – their crime spree is nothing more than a game to them, a way of making a name for themselves in a world where it is so easy to fade into the crowd. As a result, all they can do is run as far as they can before the consequences catch up with them – if all else fails, at least if they can’t be free together, they can meet their fates together when that day inevitably comes.

Terrence Malick is one of the few great directors who still genuinely stirs a great deal of controversy and spirited discussion with some of his directorial choices, even at this point of his career. Yet, we are venturing right to the beginning of his storied career, with Badlands being his very first feature film and one of the greatest debuts from any director. A genre-bending, brooding character piece that sees us following the journey of two young people in search of some meaning, and finding it through pointless violence and excessive passion, Malick makes an extraordinarily complex film that is strengthened by many other factors alongside the fascinating story – compelling performances by the two leads who were also relatively at the beginning of their own memorable careers, gorgeous cinematography by the team of Tak Fujimoto, Stevan Larner and Brian Probyn, and a set of philosophical quandaries underlying the film in such a way that it becomes meaningful without being heavy-handed. Certainly far more simple than what we normally expect from Malick, at least by his contemporary standards, Badlands is an exquisite film, which takes us on a poignant journey into the core of working-class America, showing us a very different side to many familiar ideas: love, crime and ambition, with everything converging in a quietly intense exploration of the human condition through a very unconventional lens, where the world takes on a stark, desolate appearance, and where society is far more fragmented than it should be.

Badlands is a very simple film and essentially consists of only two characters who serve to be the embodiment of youthful idealism. Kit and Holly are the archetypal American youngsters, living out their early years in small southern towns, where all they can do is hope that they can make it out someday. The film sees them, from the outset, yearning for a better life, and their eventual escape (even though they are outlaws) is their attempt to search for some meaning in a world in which they feel completely out of place. Malick takes on a very common concept, but one that is always welcome to unique and subversive exploration: the proverbial American Dream, or rather the corruption of it. The false promises of prosperity and the realization of every ambition through hard work are addressed directly in this film, particularly in the character of Kit, who desires to make something of himself. Both he and his girlfriend Holly represent the kind of youth rarely given much attention in this period, but which certainly did exist. They occurred before the counter-culture era, where defiance was not yet vogue, and where rebellion needed to have a cause to be taken seriously by those in charge (it definitely is not a mistake that the film is loosely bookended by characters comparing Kit to James Dean). The film, in challenging expectations, questions what happens when these young individuals, who are still in their formative years and harbour the follies and naivete of youth, step out of the framework only truly existent in the work of Norman Rockwell, and deviate from what is perceived as normal social behaviour, openly going against the common decency and standards normally expected of them.

Whatever Kit and Holly are searching for is subject to interpretation – Badlands admirably doesn’t give any answers to the questions it poses. However, it does manage to convey some deeper meaning through, amongst other things, the performances of the lead. This was the first leading role for Martin Sheen, and only the second film for Sissy Spacek, and its almost surreal to watch these two performers, who would go on to become icons in their industry, playing across from each other so early in their careers. The film is centred mainly around Sheen and his defiant anti-hero, who goes from hardworking idealist to cold-blooded murderer who takes lives without any thought. He is definitely brilliant, and it is a great companion piece to his work in Apocalypse Now, which also saw him take on a very complex leading role, finding the humanity in his sometimes questionable decisions. The heart of the film, however, is Spacek, whose wide-eyed innocence never falters throughout the course of the film, even when she is starting to realize that the world is very different from what her sheltered teenage life would lead her to believe. She anchors the film and gives it the gravitas, both in terms of her simple but effective portrayal of a young woman trying to make sense of her own existence and as the narrator, conveying every emotional and psychological concept that isn’t overtly portrayed on screen. The duo is exceptional, both individually and together, and their chemistry is palpable, making their performances all the more real. A special mention must go to Warren Oates, the most reliable of character actors, who may only have a handful of scenes in Badlands, but leaves a lasting impression.

Badlands is a very different kind of crime film and doesn’t quite fit in with anything expected of the genre, which seems to be entirely intentional on the part of the director. In fact, there is a disparity between the tone of the film and the events that it portrays – meticulously paced and easygoing to an extent where it is effective but not inappropriate, Badlands is not like other films in the sub-category of “lovers on the run”, such as Bonnie and Clyde and The Honeymoon Killers (both of which seem to be influences on this film), because despite sharing similar subject matter, the intensity of those films is replaced with an almost eerie sense of tranquillity, whereby the crimes that form the core of the film occur alongside more metaphysical concepts, such as the philosophical quandaries posed by both of the main characters. There is a lot of contrast between the storyline and the way it is delivered – the recurring classical piece “Gassenhauer” by Orff, which is a quaint and hauntingly beautiful composition, is often juxtaposed with scenes of harrowing violence, which is repurposed to be beautiful in a very visceral way, whereby we aren’t in awe or support of what we are seeing, but provoked to the point where we can’t help but be drawn into this captivating tale of ambitions gone dreadfully wrong. Malick also never bothers to venture too deeply into the psychology of these characters and never tries to motivate why they chose such a life, which may seem like a narrative shortcoming, but is actually extremely beneficial to the enigmatic nature of the story, with each mysterious element of the film being an advantage to this atmospheric masterpiece of rural Americana and its broken promises.

Perhaps the reason Badlands doesn’t feel like a conventional crime film is that this isn’t the main theme of the film, at least not in the broader sense. This film is centred around the simple concept of romance, which Malick does through placing Spacek’s character at the core of the film and showing the film from mostly her perspective, demonstrating their reign of terror through her supposedly innocent eyes. This doesn’t only account for the fact that the director was trying to make a truly romantic film about two terrible individuals, with the emphasis being on their passionate romance in the midst of extreme violence (after all, Holly is much more than just a teenaged girl eloping with an older, enigmatic man, but a nuanced character with a wide range of underlying complexities), as well as the very unconventional, easygoing tone of the film. The love story between Kit and Holly is a fascinating one and something that should be explored further in subsequent viewings, as this finds itself being a love story that contains a great deal of meaning without actually dismissing the darker subject matter surrounding it. The beauty in Badlands comes in the smallest moments, such as the lovers retreat into the forest, where they spend their days dancing and fishing, quietly passing the time until their actions catch up to them. Malick’s decision to centralize this idea, rather than the more traditionally cinematic elements, worked wonderfully, as it gives the film a different tone, which effectively isolates it from other films of this kind, and allows it to explore a broader range of themes, many of them residing within the realm of the emotional rather than the narrative.

However, this is not the only kind of romance present in Badlands, as we see Kit pursuing crime with a lustful ferocity, seemingly without any discernible motivation. The majority of the film sees us follow the character through his growing taste for violence, and its only natural to wonder why he is doing what he’s doing – after all, the film never really gives us much background into who he was as a character (and the real-life individual who he was based on is equally as puzzling). What initially seemed like a shortcoming eventually became the most profound moment in the entire film, when a character asks Kit (after his arrest), why he chose a life of crime. His response is simple: “I always wanted to be a criminal” – it’s in this moment that Malick indicates the American Dream has been achieved. Children are told they can be anything, and not many of them actually grow up to achieve their goals. Kit’s desires were simple – he wanted to be a criminal. No other motivation or reason for doing it, other than a strongwilled desire to adhere to a life of crime, defying the law until he could no more (his arrest only happens after his own voluntary surrender), which is his version of an ideal life. It may have been a short one, and one that certainly shouldn’t be romanticized, but remains a stark representation of the lengths an individual will go to achieve a certain desire.

It is extremely difficult to not be blown away by the might of this film and the story it tells, especially when it is framed in such a gorgeous way, which captivates the viewer and takes them on a disconcerting but powerful journey into the lives of two people searching for a better life through a life of criminal behaviour. Badlands is pure visual poetry, an attempt on the part of Terrence Malick to explore the roots of the human condition in a way that had rarely been done with this kind of overt ambition, presenting us with two young lovers who realize their own ambitions not through passionate love, but through violence against others. It is a desolate, heartbreaking film, but also an understated collection of stark images strung together by a poignant story that says more about society than it does about these two semi-fictional people who represent the extremity of the corrupted American Dream, and the tendency for even the most tenacious of individuals to struggle when trying to survive in a world that doesn’t resemble the one we were promised in any way. The acting is exceptional, the visuals absolutely stunning and the storyline poignant and honest, which makes Badlands one of the most impressive directorial debuts of the 1970s, and an enduring classic of American cinema that takes a daring approach to the message it conveys, and finds a sorrowful beauty in its relentlessly bleak portrayal of humanity.