The film SAMSARA, in cinemas from 31 August, is a visually driven portrait of the globe. With its Sanskrit title, the movie is loosely organized according to the cyclical Hindu notion of birth, death and rebirth. SAMSARA was shot over five years on five continents and in 25 countries.



Earth 2 Hub's Head of Creative and Director Frank Da Silva meets Ron Fricke and Mark Magidson.



The filmmakers approach non verbal filmmaking with an understanding that it must live up to the standard of great still photography, revealing the essence of a subject, not just its physical presence. SAMSARA was photographed entirely in 70mm film, utilizing standard frame rates and with a motion control time-lapse camera designed specifically for the project. This camera system allows perspective shifts to reveal extraordinary views of ordinary scenes. The images were then transferred through the highest resolution scanning process available to the new 4K digital projection format, which allows for mesmerizing images of unprecedented clarity. SAMSARA will be a showpiece for the new, high-resolution 4K digital projection, the HD format, as well as standard digital and film projection.

SAMSARA covers many world issues, disasters, cultural tradition and global development – including the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina; the rubbish dump children of Payatas, Manila and in Ghana, who live and feed from the mountains of rubbish; US gun politics, where families are owning guns from a young age (and resonates so strongly with yet another recent gun massacre at the Colorado Batman Premiere). It also looks at Western industrial processes – factories and slaughterhouses - which is a timely reminder of what our first world nation is built on. The film is a powerful meditation on natural and man-made disasters and phenomena and has viewers leaving the cinema mesmerised by its scale and intense beauty.

Ron Fricke and Mark Magidson on location at Versailles/France for Samsara.
Photo courtesy of Magidson Film, Inc © 2012

It reunites the director Ron Fricke with the producer Mark Magidson, who also worked together on the visually focused film BARAKA (1992) and CHRONOS (1985). SAMSARA Director Ron Fricke was second unit Director of Photography for Lucasfilm on STAR WARS: Episode III and was Director of Photography on Francis Ford Coppola’s HD feature film MEGALOPOLIS.

SAMSARA Theatrical Trailer from Baraka & Samsara on Vimeo.

SAMSARA is in cinemas from 31 August 2012
Find Samsara on Facebook | Twitter | Official website

Background image: photo courtesy of Magidson Film, Inc © 2012.
Scene from Samsara (Myanmar/Burma).

Earth 2 Hub™ would like to thank Arrow Films.