Movie Review of Ashtanga, NY: A Yoga Documentary

For my research paper topic, I choose to explore the practice of meditation. Meditation is a discipline that focuses the mind on awareness or a certain thought. When one thinks of meditation, the first image that often comes to mind is of a figure sitting on the floor in a quiet and tranquil area, with eyes close and feet crossed. The described meditating procedure is a common way meditation is practiced, but not the only way. Yoga is form of meditation that involves a series of postures and stretches that are made in sync with the breath. Yoga is thought to bring a variety of benefits to the physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual aspects of one’s life.

For this reason, I choose to use a film called Ashtanga, NY: A Yoga Documentary to aid me in my research paper. I would agree with the title in consider this film to be a documentary because only real life footage was used to make it. This film was initially created to document a month long yoga workshop that was taking place in New York. However, during this workshop, the tragic event of 9/11 occurred. The documentary then takes an unexpected twist to show the affect yoga had on these traumatized New York citizens. The documentary interviewed a variety of participants, as well as the teachers of the workshop, to get an understanding of what their impression of yoga was. In addition, there was a vast amount of footage showing movements and postures that are involve in yoga. With the exception of a few aspects, I believe Astanga, NY proved to be a well produced and informative documentary.

Midway through my first viewing Astanga, NY, I realized how well made this documentary was. It gave off a very soothing and calming vibe throughout the film. This may have been due to the appropriate music that was played during the documentary, as well as the lighting it was shot in. Most of the scenes were shot in rooms that were eliminated by bright sunlight. In addition, the documentary captured the participants of the workshop in their most natural state. You could see and almost feel the concentration and focus these people had while doing their practices. This documentary did an excellent job of using a style of filming and producing that was befitting to the topic of interest.

For the most part, I thought that Ashtanga, NY was an interesting documentary to watch. I really enjoyed seeing the different yoga positions being practiced. Some of them looked extremely difficult to do, and it was impressive to see the workshop participants maneuvering their bodies in ways that I would never have imagined. I was also very intrigued by what the interviewed participants said about their experience with yoga. I plan to use their insights on yoga to strengthen my research for my paper. On the other hand, this documentary was not as inspiring as I would have hoped for it to be. When I found out that this documentary was made in the midst of 9/11, I was eager to see how yoga meditation was used in such a tragic event. The film did show a chanting practice that took place in reverence to those who were hurt and killed by the plane crashes, but to my surprise, only a small portion of the documentary was attributed to affect yoga had on these dismayed citizens. Overall, I am glad I viewed this documentary. It may not be my most valuable source for my paper, but it did give me a better understanding of yoga meditation as a whole.