At the start of the week, news surfaced that Terrence Malick was facing a lawsuit from the investors of his long-developing trio of films, “The Voyage Of Time,” over alleged, persistent delays in completing the years in the making project. As with most Malick projects, the exact makeup of the creative team tends to kept under wraps but one of the juicier parts of the reports that circulated noted that “an Academy Award-winning special effects artist” had walked off the film. Legendary FX talent Douglas Trumbull—who won an Academy Scientific and Engineering Award in 1993, worked with Malick on “The Tree Of Life” and was reported previously to be helping on ‘Voyage’—has been speculated in some quarters to be that person. But as he revealed to us, he was never really involved in the first place.
“I have the deepest respect for Terrence Malick, and greatly enjoyed helping him on ‘Tree of Life.’ I consider him to be a good personal friend and professional contemporary,” Trumbull told The Playlist. “I offered my consulting services to him as a friend, since I do not offer special photographic effects services. Due to delays in his schedule as well as my own directing projects, it became impossible for me to come aboard ‘Voyage of Time.’ I did not ‘exit’ the movie.”
Indeed, Trumbull has been busy assembling his high tech short film entitled “UFOTOG“—shot in 4K 3D at 120 frames per second—in addition to a couple more sci-fi full length features, while Malick has been on tear since “The Tree Of Life,” shooting “To The Wonder,” “Knight Of Cups” an currently untitled third feature. So, it’s easy to see how their calendars were unable to mesh.
More likely to come as “The Voyage Of Time” lawsuit rolls along, while we also wait to see when Malick’s next couple of features will surface.
