Powaqqatsi (1988)

Powaqqatsi, or "life in transformation," is the second part of a projected trilogy of experimental documentaries whose titles derive from Hopi compound nouns. The now legendary Koyaanisqatsi, or "life out of balance," was the first. Naqoyqatsi, or "life in war," once it obtains funding, will be the third. Powaqqatsi finds director Godfrey Reggio somewhat more directly polemical than before, and his major collaborator, the composer Philip Glass, stretching to embrace world music.

Reggio reuses techniques familiar from the previous film (slow motion, time-lapse, superposition) to dramatize the effects of the so-called First World on the Third: displacement, pollution, alienation. But he spends as much time beautifully depicting what various cultures have lost--cooperative living, a sense of joy in labor, and religious values--as he does confronting viewers with trains, airliners, coal cars, and loneliness. What had been a more or less peaceful, slow-moving, spiritually fulfilling rural existence for these "silent" people (all we hear is music and sound effects) becomes a crowded, suffocating, accelerating industrial urban hell, from Peru to Pakistan. Reggio frames Powaqqatsi with a telling image: the Serra Pelada gold mines, where thousands of men, their clothes and skin imbued with the earth they're moving, carry wet bags up steep slopes in a Sisyphean effort to provide wealth for their employers. While Glass juxtaposes his strangely joyful music, which includes the voices of South American children, a number of these men carry one of their exhausted comrades out of the pit, his head back and arms outstretched--one more sacrifice to Caesar. Nevertheless, Reggio, a former member of the Christian Brothers, seems to maintain hope for renewal. --Robert Burns Neveldine Amazon.com

Phenomenal Integration of Sight and Sound

This is the second in the "Qatsi" trilogy presented by director Godfrey Reggio and composer Philip Glass (plus many other gifted persons). It can stand alone as a fantastic sight and sound metaphor on the progress (or rather regress) of the "Southern Peoples" of the planet as the values of the "Western/Northern Peoples" infiltrate in virus-like manner to depersonify and disenfranchise people from their cultural roots. It is an apt sequel to Koyaanisqatsi and precursor to the third and final film Naaqatsi (sp?), the sight and sound metaphor of how humanity has become so engrossed in and dependent on technology, it is impossible to distinguish where one ends and the other begins. All three movies require a prerequisite mindset of patience. For those who need dialogue, plot and certain resolution, these are not the movies for you. But for the persevering, these are visionary and captivating, if not prophetic of the age in which we have found ourselves. May 14, 2008

Is this film for you?

Allow me to step backwards for a brief moment and ask an important question: Is it possible to enjoy this film without delving into the quasi-intellectual mind? In other words, is this a film you would choose to watch on a lazy Saturday afternoon?

To answer that question, it's really going to depend on who you are, what you readily enjoy about film (in general), and what sort of time you wish to spend with an artistic documentary with absolutely no dialogue and seemingly no plot. In a sense, this film does seem to drag on - and you might find yourself squirming near the last 10 to 15 minutes, anxious for the film to draw to a close. However, the last 10 to 15 minutes are perhaps the most compelling as the music shifts from an driving, almost industrial pulse to a Muslim sheik calling to prayer, which, in turn, gives the images new meaning, also allowing for emotions to be easily stirred.

Images flash by one after another of people in various third world countries, which, if you happen to just watch the film without any intellectual thought whatsoever, can easily come across as a National Geographic project. Is this a bad thing, though? I don't think it is. In fact, instead of analyzing the motifs which the director uses, or contemplating how the music links to images, why not just set aside some time when the bills have been paid, the kids are at a friend's house, and you've got at least an hour to spend doing whatever to just put on thie film and enter a world you might not otherwise witness?

Is this a movie you might choose to watch on a last Saturday afternoon? Again, if you're comfortable with the notion of compelling images, an overwhelming message, all embraced by outstanding music, then I believe you'll discover the answer to be 'yes'. April 23, 2008

I M H O

This movie drags on and on...it is has some striking scenery in the beginning and you oooh and ahhh for the first 15 minutes, but then it just drags out until I finally turned it off...Boring! I can see what point they were trying to make, but they took too long to make it. Everything could have surmised in a nice, short 30 minute version...Don't waste your time... December 31, 2006

When will that train ever stop?

With a never ending train (in Africa, raw materials trains can be even longer - several kilometers I've heard), with that inimitable music to boot, Powaqquatsi shifts gear to reveal the complex world of Western civilisation after lots of shots of people in the third world and various graphic image collections from the rural developing world. The opening sequence of miners hauling up dirt is powerful. Amongst the best things about the film is the music and the skill in editing. Lots of people stare back at you and the question that screams in the head is "what do we want?" or "what do they want?" and questions about meanings and futilities. All the images are so special, usually slowed down. Sitting under the approaching feet of people on a ferris wheel. There are connected sequences of film such as people washing, people crossing roads, people carrying things. I think this film will be so inspirational to anyone who would like to create something that may arouse a sense of meaning and questioning. Our complex world in all its beauty and poverty is revealed devastatingly. There is a little girl who walks in front of some graffiti, looking at the camera, she stops, stares at the camera having walked almost out of the shot, and then she resumes walking to disappear. November 19, 2006

different kind of film experience

This movie begs you to think...it bombards you with images, sometimes directly related...sometimes thematically linked... and tells a story about the world, forcing you to see the intricacies of life, how the world has been transformed...what in that transformation is abrasive and harmful, and what is intriguing, mysterious and beautiful...unfortunately the music isn't a brilliant as the film...but still...for anyone interested in indie film/documentary and image-flooding...this is an excellent buy. August 7, 2006

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