Siddhartha

This is much smoother but less interesting than Conrad Rooks' other earlier and more cultish film, his drug autobiography `Chappaqua' (1966), which has cameos by Allen Ginzburg, William Burroughs, and jazzman Ornette Coleman in it. The trouble is `Siddhartha,' beautiful as it is, is a simplification of a simplification, and a spiritual quest isn't something you necessarily understand better through lush visuals, though unquestionably some of Sven Nykvist's watery landscapes with trees are unforgettable, the color is deep and rich, the music is pleasing, and the principals are awfully good looking people. Not surprisingly the high point cinematically is the sequence showing erotic encounters between the handsome lapsed sadhu, Siddhartha (Shashi Kapoor), and the lovely courtesan, Kamala. Simi Garewal, who plays Kamala, is a gorgeous creature whose lovely eyes, long aristocratic nose, and pouty lips remind one of the all-time arch teaser and sexy sophisticate of English films, Joan Greenwood. But Ms. Greenwood never was got up in the kind of exquisite gilded see-through gear Simi wears in her scenes with Shashi Kapoor. She's something to look at.

When his buddy Govinda decides earlier to follow the Buddha, Siddhartha leaves Govinda bereft by deciding to go off on his own lone search, without a guru. It seems that the point is you must pursue your quest on your own. But Siddhartha's splitting with Govinda seems somewhat meaningless since at the end of the movie, Siddhartha has joined up with the peaceful boatman he met years earlier toward the end of his sadhu period, and he winds up spouting the boatman's words of wisdom: live in the present, stop seeking, don't worry, be happy, and watch the river. The Buddha apparently hasn't helped Govinda all that much either, since he meets Siddhartha again and also needs to be taught the boatman's simple doctrines. One can't help thinking they'd both have done better staying with the Buddha, who did, after all, found one of the world's great religions.

It's rather amusing that during the two men's youthful sadhu period, when they're on the road with a group of penniless holy men, `meditation' is represented as singing rhythmically and passing a bong. My picture of this activity was different, but `Chappaqua' shows how obsessed with and involved in drugs Conrad Rooks was.

This is a lovely, but empty and ultimately not very cinematic film. Sven Nykvist's photography is at the service of a vision so generalized (Siddhartha is a universal type, not an individual), that too often the images look like something out of `National Geographic' with mise-en-scène by Bollywood. The scenes are not as exotic as those Pasolini created for his `Arabian Nights' (1974), nor are Rooks' depictions of Indian rural life ever remotely as real as Satyajit Ray's in the `Apu Trilogy.' For a trippier film version of Hermann Hesse, see Fred Haines' `Steppenwolf,' which came two years after `Siddhartha,' in 1974. For a more original film depiction of a spiritual quest, see the story of G.I. Gurdjieff as done by Peter Brooks in `Meetings with Remarkable men' (1979).

I saw the movie Siddhartha some time ago because when I first saw the title, I recognized it as a philosophical work from my college days when I study Hesse's work from my philosophy class.

It is a great film: I enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed the book by Hermann Hesse. As a philosophy major, the philosophical underlinings in the movie are most appropriate. It is by all accounts, a true Hesse's commentary on the meaning of life and man's condition on earth.

I especially liked the music although the lyrics were foreign to me. I wish I could get a translation of the songs that made the film even more enjoyable.

A great philosophical work of art.

I used to love Hermann Hesse and this book in my teens. Still, I love this film, even because I consider it to be a very appropriate filming.

Hesse's characters are mostly soul-searchers wandering around in rather artificial surroundings - which is true in the case of this timeless, ancient India. As he is prone to put all the meaning into lengthy, philosophical dialogues, this makes him utterly difficult to turn into film.

This film manages to capture both: the artificiality of the setting as well as the philosophical sincereness - plus that certain naive sense of beauty that makes Hesse so appealing and disgusting at once. A good deal of the films success is due to Sven Nykvist's marvellous camera work, done mostly with natural light. (The few scenes with set light are awful.) The beauty of the landscapes is not only the superficial one of a postcard, but the philosophical one that tells you that a beautiful world is essentially a good, complete, happy world: a world in which you can afford to completely focus on your personal search for meaning and spirituality. Well, personally I don't believe this, but this movie had me suspending my belief for 90 minutes. What a comforting experience.

This film is stunning in its beauty. The music is transcendent. For the longest time I tried to get the soundtrack. To save you the trouble, be aware that they never made one! There is one scene in which a woman blows on a shell that was so powerful I still remember 30 years later. Mesmerizing. If you have not seen it yet, rent it today.

After seeing this movie again in New York recently and noticing that it was going to be available on DVD, I ordered it immediately through Amazon.com and decided to send the following comments, which were posted in the "customer reviews" section:

1. The plot. The Nobel Prize winner, Hermann Hesse, wrote Siddhartha in 1922. It is a novel about Eastern spirituality (many Indian scholars consider it as one of the few successful examples of Indian philosophy presented by a Western author). Siddhartha is one of the names given to the Buddha himself. The novel narrates the pilgrimage of the son of a Brahmin, his struggle to find his own destiny; his friendship with Govinda (his "shadow"); his encounters with many different people: the Samanas (the ascetics that practice self-denial); Kamala (a courtesan who claims that she can teach and provide love as an art); Kamasawami (a rich merchant who becomes his boss); and Vasudeva... - note Vasudeva is another name given to Krishna, the teacher/driver of Arjuna in the Bhagavad-Gita).

2. The Movie. In 1972, Conrad Rooks (an almost unknown movie director who made "Chappaqua" in 1966) came out with a 94-minute movie transcription of Hesse's novel. He engaged Sven Nykvist (the famous Swedish cinematographer of Igmar Bergman) and a mainly Indian cast, including Shashi Kapoor (Siddhartha), Simi Garewal (Kamala), Romesh Sharma (Govinda) and Zul Vellani (Vasudeva). The beautiful music was composed by Hemanta Mukherjee (I hope the soundtrack will be available soon). It will be particularly enjoyable for those who have read the book. In many of the scenes the synergism produced by the photography, the music and the acting is superb. And with few exceptions, the movie is a good transcription of the book. The book and the movie became part of the "cult culture" of the West coast of the early seventies, but it never got the attention of the general public. With a condescending tone, Leonard Maltin refers to the movie as "too arty, but on-location photography ... is often dazzling".

After seeing the DVD transfer I was very happy with its high quality. There are 27 interesting minutes of comments made by Conrad Rooks about why and how he made the movie 30 years ago. With the DVD technology I am able to enjoy my favorite scenes and particularly the music of Hemanta Mukherjee on texts from another Nobel Prize, Rabindranath Tagore. Because of these unforgettable moments, I give a rating of 10, absolving Rooks from his "youth sins".