Sadhana

“Sadhana, the Enchanted Journey Back to the Source, a new Canadian documentary by Jean-Pierre Piché and Marcel Poulin recounts a singular and subjective search for freedom and self-knowledge. “Sadhana” means “the path to enlightenment” through yoga of the mind and body, but this is not a ‘how-to’ film, nor does it attempt to convert the onlooker; it documents Marcel’s conversations with his various spiritual leaders and uses narration to reveal Marcel’s own thoughts during his off-times stormy odyssey.

Fittingly, Marcel’s first spiritual guide is an old benedictine monk named Bede Griffiths who practices a combination of Christianity and Hinduism and guides his student toward the Eastern emphasis on meditation and mind relaxation as a means to attaining knowledge of the self. Beginning at the sacred mountain at Arunachala and the ashram, or temple dedicated to Sri Ramana Maharshi whose teachings on the self proved an inspiration to Marcel, this young disciple goes in search of a Hindu spiritual guide.

Swami Premananda is a smiling, soft-spoken young man who counsels Marcel to immerse himself in Indian culture and tradition as a starting point to his search for truth.

Marcel joins Bhairav Muni, a sadhu, a ‘seeker’ of enlightenment, accompanying him on his pilgrimages from one holy place to another until the ascetic leads him to the Kumbha Mela, a 40-day religious festival held at Hardwar, a holy city at the foot of the Himalayas. At the river basin where the Ganges starts its course along the plain, 80 million faithfuls come every 12 years to bathe in the water into which, according to Hindu mythology, the nectar of immortality had been dropped thousand of years ago. Weaving its way through endless crowds, the camera documents Marcel’s initiation to the ritual.

After the Kumbha Mela festivities, Marcel travels alone to the Valley of the Gods where he meets Swami Shyam (it means ‘Blue Space’) who helps him sort out his feelings and his experiences. “He was the living answer to my questions,” says Marcel of this charming, articulate and inspiring sage. Alone, these scenes of Marcel’s talks with Swami Shyam, a living example of Hindu enligthtenment are worth the price of admission. Breathtaking shots of the Himalayan valley tempt one to book a flight to India, while Marcel’s enlightening walks with the swami prepare him to finally seek his own answers with renewed self-confidence.

Sadhana is technically straightforward in its approach, well-paced and coherent. The screenplay, co-written by Marcel Poulin, Jean-Pierre Piché and Sid Goldberg focuses on a subjective journey toward self-knowledge; it is not overladden with religious or historic information and succeeds as a documentary by making the viewer curious for more details.

In our increasingly impersonal world of computers, multi-national corporations and ecological chaos, it is logical for an individual to search for a meaning to his life. Some will search for it in ritualized religion while others will strive to find it in ancient Eastern belief systems more closely aligned with nature. Sadhana teaches us to understand the world by understanding the self, for while the world may be in turmoil, our minds and spirits need not be.”