In my younger days, L.A. was Bayside High, California Dreams, Encino Man, "Valley Girls," Beverly Hills 90210, Disneyland, Hollywood, the Oscars. Or it was a place of constant calamity: the Northridge earthquake, mudslides, fires, various  car chases chronicled by the vulture news helicopters L.A. helped normalize. The point is: my understanding of L.A. was (and still is, to some extent) formed by media portrayals, mass-communicated narratives of "reality" packaged chiefly as entertainment. This is how we understand the world.

Part of the reason why I love the films of Terrence Malick is because I feel that he articulately expresses this dualism through a uniquely poetic mode of artistry. In each of his films there is both beauty and ugliness, joy and tragedy—the best and worst of man, and the best and worst of nature.