2008, USA
Documentary, Drama
READ THE REVIEW AT The Desert Sun.
Extended version:
The blessing and curse of documentaries are that the filmmaker has little control over the subject. The resulting film may be wholly different from the original intent of the director. Take, for example, the popular design behind any 30-days-to-a-better-you program, or as with Enlighten Up!, six months of yoga to a better person.
First-time feature film director Kate Churchill chose Nick Rosen -- a cynical, disillusioned ex-journalist -- as her yogi-to-be, and he could not be less enthusiastic about the affair. As a seven-year follower herself, she has lofty ideas about the great changes Nick will undergo. Yet from the start, he distances himself from any radical mind alteration and is only vaguely amused by the physical benefits.
In true journalistic fashion, director and subject sample the buffet of New York City offerings of yoga. They visit one studio where an attendee describes the lessons as orgasmic, while another focuses on numerology which Nick labels as "Kunda-looney." As they jump from various intensities and religious levels, he fails to find a world view expressed in a class where he feels comfortable.
After speaking with knowledgeable authorities on yoga, it becomes obvious that Nick is more interested in the research than the practice. He visits the great yogis of the world, beginning with the absurdly gauche practice of ex-wrestler Diamond Dallas Page (who puts the T&A back in Namaste) and ultimately to the wise and patient philosophies of yogis in India who focus far more on the religious aspects than the physical focus of the Western world.
Herein lies the problem: Nick has no interest in achieving spiritual enlightenment. As yogis inform him that physical efforts will pay off in religious rewards, he never finds the answer he seeks -- because he is not the one searching. As Churchill becomes more impatient behind the camera, it becomes obvious that this is her quest, and Nick is destroying it. As he fails to gain the peace she imagined, she falls into the disenchanted territory he created.
The advice of the various healers is refreshingly blunt, and though Nick appreciates the counsel of the tougher masters, he sidesteps any possibility for illumination which concludes every good 12-step program. He is encouraged by a guide to ask a revered saint more difficult questions, but Nick cannot get past a rudimentary discussion concerning the basic premise of religion in yoga. To a man without religion, this is a giant hurdle; to the many yogis he asks these basic quandaries, there is little challenge.
Enlighten Up! is an interesting film both for what it reveals and what it fails to achieve, saying much about both the director and the subject. With a practice such as yoga that is so individually focused, it is quite telling when others do not live up to our expectations – a good lesson for a director's debut.