Review – Samsara

Samsara is a visual documentary filmed over a period of almost five years, in twenty-five countries. What’s a visual documentary? Well, it’s a lot like a normal documentary, except without any dialogue. Zilch. No narration, no interviews and no Morgan Freeman.

But just because it doesn’t have any dialogue, doesn’t mean it doesn’t have a story. Quite the contrary. In fact, Samsara has more story and substance to it than all the Twilight movies combined. But then again, that’s not very hard.

Samsara, a Sanskrit word for “the ever turning wheel of life”, is a story about the interconnection that runs through all our lives.  It shows us the beauty of this world and chaos of life, religion, production, consumerism, crime and punishment. It is a grand and ambitious project, with each scene comprising of sweeping landscapes and vibrant colours.

Although it starts off very slowly, and yes we almost dozed off in the first 15 minutes, the movie really picks up from that point on. And over the course of the next ninety minutes or so, it successfully drives home some very important (and heavy) messages. Which is a great achievement for a movie without any dialogue really. Maybe more movies should try this approach.

We highly recommend this movie for all ages and suggest that you go see it at a cinema with a big screen (i.e. Eximax at Palace).