I did a search, but couldn't find any threads already existing on this film. Correct me, if I'm wrong, I'd love to read some discussion about it.
Has anyone else seen it?
I admit to owning the soundtrack almost a year before buying the film, partially because I was hesitant to watch what I thought might be nothing more than art school wankery.
To say I was pleasantly surprised would be an incredible understatement.
The film is one of the most powerful I have ever seen. Perhaps the concept - documenting all of human existence in little over an hour - is impossibly overambitious, but the result it something that's so incredibly moving to watch. There were times where I laughed out loud, and times where I had to fight back tears. Some of the images continue to be ingrained in my mind, long after popping the disc out of my DVD player.
I must warn those interested that the film can be explicit. Everything from childbirth to graphic sex to gruesome images of Hiroshima victims, police brutality, and famine are bared naked on the screen without any pretense of censorship. Nudity is common, as is violence and death. The sex segment of the film even surprised me some with its lack of restraint. As one reviewer on rottontomatoes.com said, however, "if the stronger, more controversial images disturb you, it's about time to face the fact that all of this is what makes us alive." I couldn't agree more.
It oscillates wildly between the depressing and the inspiring - images showing both mankind's capability for beauty, as well as its capability for destruction. Despite this, it refuses to pass judgement.
The film is also a website, on which the story behind every single clip in the film can be read. It truly is fascinating, although I wouldn't recomend looking at it before you see the film itself.
Anyway, I think I'm off to go watch it again. |
