Documentary Film "Samsara" (2011)

At first magnificent, overflowing with colour and form, breathtaking with the vastness of deserts and the grandeur of mountains. Full of life and movement. Pure and sacred. Then suddenly harsh, direct, showing the face of death, poverty and degradation. Like a magnificent mandala made by Buddhist monks - and like dust.

A film that delights the eyes and occupies the mind, that inspires wonder and causes pain, that makes one think about the meaning of human life. Everything is transient; every detail, every small thing matters - and at the same time does not matter. A human being as a colourful speck of dust, a significant component of the world's mandala. But only a speck of dust and nothing more.

Human individuality, ego, dissolves when one arrives at the most primitive question - survival. Like a mandala, one speck of dust is at its centre, another at its very edge; one in a skyscraper in Abu Dhabi, another in an Indian slum that has grown up beside a rubbish dump. Everything and everyone concentrates around a centre - around the relics of St. Peter in the Vatican, around Mecca, around the Wailing Wall, and so on. But all it takes is the slightest breath of wind and all that centring turns to dust. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

The documentary film "Samsara" was filmed over five years, in 25 countries across the world and on five continents. It encompasses all religions, natural wonders, the world's most grandiose buildings and sacred sites. The film runs 102 minutes. Time well spent in front of a television screen.