Mindwalk

This film is a philosophical conversation between three intelligent people coming from vastly different backgrounds, each being experts in their respective fields of politics, physics and poetry. The three discuss the dominant paradigm of modern culture and how it is limiting when trying to solve the world's problems. When I saw it I was so excited about it that I told all of my friends to watch it, I also added that they would need to watch it when they are alert enough to grasp what is being said. In other words watch it after drinking coffee not after having dinner. The film doesn't evoke adrenaline surges or erotic fantasy; rather it nourishes the mind by forcing you to think. If you don't know what a paradigm is then this film is not for you. It may be too intellectual for the average movie watcher and perhaps is its own unique genre of film.

I had first seen the trailer for this movie when watching Kafka & was instantly interested. It was well worth the money I spent! This movie really made me think. Sam Waterston (LAW & ORDER) was excellent in this role. He was just facinating in his diversity of acting. Liv Ulman who I had never seen until this movie kept me listening & John Heard was great too. If you like to think & like to watch just strict drama I recommend watching this movie. You have to be ready to just sit & watch . There is not body count or sex in this film. It's just pure, simple & facinating thinking. Oh yeah & catch Kafka if you can too great movie!

Being an egghead of sorts and a student of so many philosophies, I thoroughly enjoyed this movie the first time I watched it, and each time after that. Sam Waterston, Liv Ullman, and John Heard star as 3 people who meet by chance while touring an island. They then spend the rest of the movie talking about various scientific and philosophical concepts. There are brief (and very wooden) appearances by Ione Skye as the daughter of Liv's character.

The topics they discuss are fairly heady, but despite the edgy nature of their topics, the discussion never becomes heated or even mildly animated. Others have made the perfectly valid point that the dialog is one-sided, and I completely agree. Topics of this kind of importance and scope demand a discussion with all viewpoints represented. Otherwise, it can't approach the real heart of the issue, and it spirals rapidly into intellectual propaganda. These are good topics and valid points; they deserve better treatment. Nonetheless, the movie was enlightening on some levels.

I you're going to watch it, don't watch it to be entertained or awed by an auteur's cinematic masterpiece (which this isn't); watch it to expand your mind. Pay no attention to the plot (thin as it is) or the acting (stiff and clumsy at times). Just open your mind to the ideas expressed, then think about it after the movie has ended, because the topics discussed can go so much farther. The movie falls a bit short in expressing them; you'll have to finish the journey yourself.

Mindwalk opens with two friends going on a visit to Mont St. Michel in Normandy, France. A beautiful and significant place for its embodiment of the visions of early Western Civilization.

While walking among the island the poet and politician meet a scientist and all three join together in a day long conversation. I love these kind of talk movies, like "My Dinner With Andre", but I love other movies as well, but to date to be different and inject ideas into movies is something I really respect, even if I don't agree with the ideas.

"Mindwalk" is a 1990 feature film directed by Bernt Amadeus Capra, based on his own short story, based in turn on the book The Turning Point by his brother Fritjof Capra, the author of the book The Tao of Physics. I've never been impressed with unscientific and non- mathematical illuminations of physics, but "Mindwalk" is not really about physics, it is about the mind of Western Civilization and where it has been and where it is going.

This movie was made in 1990, released September 9, 1990, and in the intervening 23 years a lot has changed that I would say totally is in harmony with what was said in this movie about how the mind of man, the scientist, in this case a woman, critical, has created so much but has used it in ways that have brought about so many problems and so much pain.

Mont. St. Michel is an island monastery, a fortification, an apt place to analogize the Western mind. On that island are the remnants and institutions that have held Western Civilization together, and indeed expanded it. At one point in the movie they enter the torture chamber with all its implements of pain - used on anyone who had a different thought.

Now it is starting to dawn on us that progress comes from the people who have different thoughts. This is a beautiful and intelligent movie. There is no real plot, no action, no explosions, romance or sex, but it will provoke a thought a two. Lucky we don't get sent to the torture chamber these days for that, although reading some people's reviews I think there are those people still out there stuck in the 500's. Not the crowning times of Western Civilization.

10/10 ... an outstanding movie with real ideas expressed beautifully and courageously.

It might be a little hyperbolic for me to say this movie changed my life, but it has certainly been a mainstay since a friend and I discovered it quite by accident several years ago. We knew Fritjof Capra as an author and knew that one of his books is what brother Bernt used as a skeleton for the movie. I find it HIGHLY ENTERTAINING over and over to this very day, because I understand that GOOD CONVERSATION is a lost and discounted art. This movie captures, in a breath-takingly beautiful and dynamic setting, one of the best dialogues in the history of thought. It communicates in relatively simple terms some of the most important and expansive issues of today, but it does not spoon-feed the viewer. It includes discourse on politics, scientific concepts, influences on perspective, as well as having some great lines, interesting quotes, and memorable, well-presented poetry. Its theme is to communicate through dialogue, monologue, descriptive prose, music, guided visual imagery, constant changes in setting (all in one locale, VERY IMPRESSIVE cinematographical work) and (yes) even drama and antagonism between the characters. The theme is borne of a new school of thought, and understanding and assimilating the message is something a person can actually do to make the a world better place.