20130910: Documentary Review--Samsara

Samsara

1. Fundamentals
1. American live action feature length documentary, 2011, rated PG-13, 102 minutes.
2. IMDB: 8.2/10.0 from 8,384 users; estimated budget of 4 million USD.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 77% on the meter; 86% from 10,673 audience ratings.
4. Directed by: Ron Fricke; screenplay by Mark Magidson and Ron Fricke.
5. Starring: no one in particular.


2. Setup and Plot
1. Human subjects are urged to look at the camera and not speak and not smile.
2. Taped subjects such as landscapes are sometimes shown at altered speeds.
3. Cool images: pharaoh's head; castle on a peak; Tibetan images; active sand dunes; high ceilings and stained glass in cathedrals; orange dunes in stark light; dead tree stumps against the rotation of the stars in the night skies; aerial videos of cities at night.
4. Uncool images: ugly old statues with massive time lapse; unused buildings filling up with sand; ruined, abandoned strip malls, stores, school rooms; automobiles and small houses interacting unnaturally; man covering his head with clay since it looks like a cheap, gimmicky horror film; chicken, bovine, pork processing; plastic surgery pre-processing; humans doing garbage recycling by hand for a living.
5. Indifferent images: oh, so many, such as the indoor skiing.
6. After watching the whole film twice, I'd say that all the images became indifferent.  This is just concatenation in void context; all significance has been driven down to zero by the silent treatment.
7. If you've got a story to tell, tell it.  Use language and planning.


3. Conclusions
1. It's awesomely beautiful in stretches, and downright ugly in others, but who cares?
2. One sentence summary: There were many images and videos, but little cohesion.
3. Three stars of five.  Here I'm giving more weight to the quality of the images, and less to the lack of connections.
4. After watching the film the first time, I read well over 50 reviews of it.  In almost all cases, the review consisted of interpretations from experiences and axes to grind from outside the film.  Frankly, it looked like stretching in every case.  Watching the film again reinforced this opinion.  Documentary films, by and large, have issues to raise and things to say about those issues.  This film has images to present, but no point of view.  The reviewers I read loaded in their own POV, whereas I'd say this film is just "I've collected a number of high quality images."


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 10/10 Stellar.


2. Sound: 8/10 Incidental music, almost no dialog.


3. Acting: N/A


4. Screenplay: 0/10 There were no points made.