in my opinion, Tree of Life does have a great narrative, it's just not a very conventional one. there are ideas and feelings and connections that the movie is trying to make purely through image and sound, as opposed to exposition, dialogue, and plotting. not that there's anything wrong with the latter, i love a ton of films that emphasize those aspects, but there is room for both types of movies in my library and, personally, i wish there were more films that tried to emphasize the visual in their art...it is a visual medium, after all, and the control over image and the way images are put together (Tarkovsky called it "sculpting in time") is what separates film from other art forms like music, theater, literature, etc. all films are inherently visual, but so many of them follow fairly standard, conventionalized patterns for shooting and editing because they're busy focusing on plot points and dialogue. filmmakers who allow the visuals and montage to do most (and sometimes all) of the talking, to evoke a variety of intellectual or emotional stimuli that can be ambiguous or astoundingly resonant, are simply trying to tap into the highest form of potential in film. now, that happens to varying degrees of success, of course, and that doesn't automatically make those types of movies "better" than the more conventional ones, but it is a very worthwhile pursuit for the directors who are gifted in that fashion.
