We caught up with Chastain last week, right after the actress began earning raves for her performance in Toronto film "The Debt," to see if she might be able to offer more clues. "I'm not sure what I can say," she began when we raised the subject. But then she did indeed say a few things.
The actress said the movie was essentially about the conflict between "nature and grace" -- which she defined as the conflict between a spiritual life and one of more primitive survival. Her character represents the former, while Pitt's stands for the latter. "And the children have to decide which path they want to take," she said.
She also said that Malick was taking a casual approach to the script. If there were seven pages of dialogue, and she didn't recall all of them, Malick would tell her to "just say what you remember."
Fidelity to Malick's script, or the absence thereof, was a theme on the set of the 2008 shoot. As Malick was casting the children in the movie, Chastain pointed out that a particular actor wouldn't work because the script called for a 5-year-old and the kid in question was too old. Malick's casual response: "Oh, Jessica, no one reads the script."
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/movies/2010/09/tree-of-life-terrence-malick-brad-pitt-jessica-chastain.html