Being a Formalist does not necessarily mean being against reality. Reality almost always has to be involved with any story. It is the foundation to every film, while formulaic touches are made on top of it. One of most formulaic films I have seen in recent memory is Darren Aronofsky’s The Fountain. It is beautiful, poignant, utterly transcending film that borders on the line of reality and phantasm.

It has three parallel story lines that connect much deeper than ordinary flashbacks or jumps to the future. The first begins in the mid 16^th century about Tomas the conquistador (Hugh Jackman) who falls in love with the queen (Rachel Weisz). The man is bound to find the Tree of Life so both him and the queen can live forever. Five-hundred years later, the same actors are in the present day. Tom is a doctor bound to save his terminally ill wife Izzy from an inoperable brain tumor. Izzy during this time is writing a book called “The Fountain” which is actually the story of the conquistador and the queen. Aronofsky gives us this hint, telling us that the first story line is from the mind of the present day Izzy. When she passes away, Tom the doctor finishes her book with another storyline taking place five hundred years later. Tom is now a 26^th century astronaut who is bound to Izzy in the form of a tree. He travels towards a dying star that is wrapped in nebula.

     There is substantial evidence that the story not only meddles with time and space, but also with the connection of reality and imagination. It is clear that the reality of the story has typical subjects; on how love can last forever and how death is inevitable. Aronofsky creates his own universe connecting inner space to the outer. The true gift is not the destination but rather the journey to the echoes of eternity. Time and space connect with each other causing a paradox between what is real and what our minds so abstractly create.