Tockinit not horrible nor great

ChanFamous I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

Bea Swanson This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Stephan Hammond It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

estebanlopezlimon There's no words but your own. You are the narrator. You are provided with amazing scenery and beautiful music. It's your job to tell the story. I didn't think a film could be used as an instrument of meditation until now. This is no form of entertainment. This the diary of mankind and you are the individual in charge of the judgment.

Christopher Culver In 1993, filmmakers Ron Fricke and Mark Magidson presented a deeply moving portrait of features universal to all human societies, warned of ecological collapse, and depicted how technology was changing our lives in BARAKA. Shot on 70mm film, this was one of the most visually impressive films ever made, and its lack of any dialogue or narration allowed viewers to engage in their own individual reflections about the panorama on the screen. Two decades later, the team returned with SAMSARA, a sequel that wasn't really necessary.One reason that SAMSARA is not very good is that it often seems a shot-for-shot repeat of BARAKA. The filmmakers revisit many of the same locations (such as Thai prostitutes, a chicken-processing plant, home appliance factories, landfill gleaners). Again Buddhism, the Ka'aba and high church Christianity are depicted, but because the film does not go on to any other religions than what was on BARAKA, these rituals feel this time like cheap exoticism instead of unquenchable anthropological curiosity. SAMSARA also lacks the dramatic arc of BARAKA, coming across as a random succession of images instead of the journey from sacredness to horror and back that we found in its predecessor.That is not to say that SAMSARA is completely without interest. There is an astonishing clip of performance artist Olivier de Sagaza, and the freakish Dubai landscape is depicting in a detail that few (even those who have been there) have seen. SAMSARA is all in all a darker film, and while depictions of the wreckage of Katrina, a Wyoming family that are proud to own an arsenal of guns, and a wounded veteran may fail to really shock viewers in the West who have already been exposed to such images for years, scenes of garish funerals in Nigeria and Indonesian men making the rounds in a sulphur mine (even though they know it is killing them) are stirring and memorable. Of course the visuals are rich, and in Bluray format on my HD projector the film is just as stunningly detailed as its predecessor.However, SAMSARA lacks enough new things to say, it surprisingly doesn't offer continual rewards on rewatching, and just by the fact that it exists out there it potentially dilutes the impact of BARAKA, once a singular film. I was entertained enough to give this a 3-star rating, but I would still recommend BARAKA, and even for those who have seen and loved BARAKA, I would not recommend moving on to this film.

Felonious-Punk Immense! This movie shows us things we're familiar with and things we have never even imagined, and yet it all comes from somewhere in our home, on our planet, within our environment. Framed by Buddhist philosophy and art, we have a god's-eye-view of all continents, all classes, so many cultures and vastly different terrains. We see the endless desert- scape, we see Cairo, the United States, China, Tibet, indigenous peoples of South America, the architecture of Rome, the worshippers of Mecca. We see various trades, the wounded, the dead, families, contrasting political and social agendas. We are left with a feeling of bittersweet grandiosity, the way that Buddhism leaves its adherents. Pain exists, we may never get rid of it. Maybe violence cannot solve violence. Maybe the path of progress is a lot slower than most of us think, maybe the only solution is to take on this weighty all-encompassing compassion that this movie offers up, and pray that it spreads by example and because it is the most virtuous and inevitable way. That's the magic of this movie, that it does not look down on anyone, it seeks to document everyone as they would be documented, and yet there is editorializing, however subtle it is: that we all have the nobility of consciousness, and we are all each as consequential as a fleck of sand upon the Sahara.

my teacher I tried watching this documentary when it came out. I somehow couldn't. A few days ago I came across it again and started watching it, but stopped after just a couple of minutes. I realized I needed full concentration & total attention. This wasn't just another documentary movie you watch while you do your crosswords or paint your nails. This is a real thing! If you watched Ron Fricke's famous 'Baraka' this one will remind you of it, but while the first one is more civilization-oriented, maybe even old-fashioned nowadays, in the years of the peak in robotics and genetic engineering, the second is more culturally focused and it deals with social differences and issues that many who are busy running through social media life may foresee, or don't know. This film will make you wish you didn't skip your history and geography classes. It will make you wish that you are a billionaire with freedom to spend his entire lifetime on traveling to distant places, breathing into the unbelievable scenery and unimaginable products of human brain. It will also make you feel very grateful because you have a nice home, warm and cozy bed and cooked dinner on your table. Its scenes will make you want to be terribly angry at times because the world is a cruel place, not immune to the rules that belong to animals only, as some think. It will make you feel powerless, yet trying to grasp why such opposites are necessary. It will make you question do you really need one more pair of jeans, new mobile phone or should all that you invest in be your knowledge at first and foremost. Scenes will changes quickly and each will make you want to hit pause and just think about it, discuss, investigate and you won't be alone -its music will be guiding you to a long, deep meditation but without trying to avoid bad, uncomfortable feelings or visualizing reality was different, because it is not. Beauty and essence of life are in the polarities.But, if you want instant opinions and observations that somebody chewed for you, you will soon come to understand that the true magic of this magnificent film begins once it is the end and you get a strong urge to begin talking about it with others. We are all 'Samsara' and we are all here for a reason. If this movie made you accept, no matter how hard it was, that life is like a sand that only revives when the wind starts to blow and swirl, then it means you passed your test of mindful, purposeful and conscious living on this earth.