Rating: 
Summary: Were we HAD ? NO: The IRE Speaks !
Review: I love pushing peoples buttons, but I very much *dislike* spreading misinformation. Since my post of September 16, questioning the 1.85:1 aspect ratio of the new MGM DVD release of Koyaanisqatsi, a few people have written in to either contradict me or uphold me. Over the weekend, I sent an e-mail to the Institute for Regional Education in Santa Fe, requesting a first-hand clarification of the matter. I received a reply bright and early this morning (Sept. 30), e-signed by Joe Beirne, Producer, Naqoyqatsi. His reply won't award the blue ribbon in this debate to any one person, but each of us will receive a piece of it to take home. I summarize:1) Koyaanisqatsi was always intended by director Godfrey Reggio, and the cinematographers, to be shown theatrically in 1.85:1 widescreen. This was the way it was shown at its premiere in 1983 at Radio City Music Hall, New York City. 2) The decision to create a 1.33:1 Academy aperture (4:3) version was made at the time of the *first telecast* on the grounds that a pan-and-scan approach would yield ludicrous results to the film on typical home sets of the time. Fortunately, the way Koyaanisqatsi was shot, they were able to "open up" the picture to full-television-screen size 4:3 (1.33:1), and every subsequent home video version was brought out employing that particular ratio. 3) With the improvements made in television sets in recent years, chiefly the rise in popularity of widescreen sets and the ability to display widescreen films adequately in the home, the decision was made this time around to take advantage of the new technology and bring out Koyaanisqatsi (and Powaqqatsi) in the aspect ratio in which they were meant to be viewed theatrically in the first place. 4) Which is the "correct" version? On that matter I will let Mr. Beirne himself speak: "I don't mean to imply that the 4x3 image in earlier transfers is somehow 'invalid'. I think this way of watching the films is very interesting. It is a mark of how carefully crafted were these films that both ratios work very well. However, in no sense is the viewer of the MGM DVDs 'losing' something by watching the films as they are shown as a motion picture, at 1.85, anymore than the audience was 'missing something' watching the premier of KOYAANISQATSI at Radio City Music Hall in 1983." I *hope* that settles this debate? BOTH home video versions of Koyaanisqatsi have the blessing the IRE as being equally valid. One last word from Mr. Beirne: "PS The Private issue DVD is no longer available, sorry." (My own PS and "last word" - I still prefer Koyaanisqatsi in 4:3)
Rating:
Summary: Amazon.com finally got me
Review: Even after reading the reviews I couldn't believe it that a current motion picture edition rerelease would again crop koyaanis so I signed up and sprung for a dvd copy. In '84 I skipped outta work early, shh..., to hit the art cinema at pearl st. boulder to see it. Ever since then I have called sony electronics "ony's" because of a logo scene later in the film. Now it appears the new nick name is "uny's". hmmm... Can't say I'll adopt that one. Oh well the dvd version is still stunning even though many scenes feel compacted because the cropping has removed some of the space around the scene as originally intended. My best guess, the original film with its theatre aspect ratio and stuning glory was only released for the formated to fit your screen. So the sides were cropped for cable. Then that format was only released which has been compressed vertically to regain to the original aspect ratio of the theatre presentation for display on the 16:9 tv's. Wish I could walk back into that art cinema and see the film again but today it is a clothing store. The other thing I have noticed is KOYAANISQATSI and POWAQQATSI won't play on my old pc's dvd but BARAKA does.
Rating: 
Summary: Almost Perfect
Review: It is hard to believe this movie is already over 20 years old. I remember seeing it on the big screen when it was first released. It was an unexpected experience to say the least. At the time, this movie left a strong impression on me, not simply a particular image or sequence, but rather the duality of the images and music. That duality is inherent throughout this movie; an observation made only on repeated viewing. There is the obvious nature vs technology duality. In parallel, this duality can be expressed as god-made vs man-made. There are the old world vs the new world, Hopi cave drawings vs high-tech cinematography and music (the movie we are watching), communication by drawing with coal vs television commercials, ocean waves swelling and receding, cities rising and falling, deserts eroding while factories assemble cars and package massive amounts of food, insurpassable terrain and numerous roads, cars, and airplanes, the slow tide of nature and the fastlane happening all at once. And in the midst of these dual forces is man, a product of the natural world creating the technological world. It is rather like the yin and yang, yang the primary color at present. Technology has usurped first place in defining the world around us and nature is merely a prelude. We are increasingly defined by our technological achievement rather than by our nature. We are gradually defined by our creation, perhaps as god is defined by us. Yet echoes of nature pulse within the concrete fortresses of our technolgy. The roads are like arteries pumping red and white cells to and fro, the factories generate food to help us survive, we record our deeds on film for posterity (the very movie we are watching is a testament of sorts),and we aspire to break free of gravity's tethers reaching for whatever lies ahead. The director claims that this movie is meant to be a journey without making any value judgment. I believe we should take him at his word. Man is depicted becoming ruled by his own creation and neglecting, even destroying, his creator. It is never confirmed that this is a bad thing, but the implication is that balance between the natural and technological worlds is inevitable. Even the old world is fading, eroding away like the deserts, monument valley a cemetery of the ancient world. A day of judgment so to speak is in the making and technology will be forced to reckon with nature one way or another. People, despite their technological prowess will buckle under nature's creative supremacy and the inescapable cycle of creation and destruction. The Hopis understood this cycle and predicted an end to koyaanisqatsi. Of course, the Hopis are victims to the cycle themselves. The media is the massage wrote Marshall Macluhan. Koyaanisqatsi is an excercise of this idea. The images and music move us, affect our perceptions of the world and ourselves on some level. On a global scale, media is inseparable from everyday life and from our collective consciousness. Via images and sounds we are moved to act, and society moves along. The cave drawings were the media-massage for the Hopis. Koyaanisqatsi is our high-tech cave drawing. The Hopis idols are destroyed slowly with the desert, our idols will be destroyed in due time. The only thing that never changes is change itself ... This seems to be the central theme of this movie, despite assertions there is no central theme. Overall I like this movie. But, I think that Godfrey Reggio failed to create a balanced artistic statement. He says the movie is not an indictment of technology and I can see that he attempted an earnest effort to make a balanced statement. Nevertheless, my gut reaction (and many others' as well) when viewing this movie is "what are we doing, what are we thinking, where are we going?" There is an element of misanthrope in this movie that is unmistakeable and largely responsible for the "environmentalist" interpretation of the movie so popular among many viewers. This is because Mr. Reggio, in my opinion, didn't quite pull off what he intended. If he had, he wouldn't need to explain his intention or his method in interviews and essays. You never heard Stanley Kubrick explaining 2001: A Space Odyssey. Regarding the format controversy I have only one comment to make. See this movie whatever the format. After you see it then argue which format is better. I have seen both the 1.33:1 and 1.85:1 versions. They are both good; my preference is wide rather than tall and this DVD is quite good.
Rating:
Summary: Life, and a world really out of balance
Review: The first of Godfrey Reggio's finally finished trilogy, Koyaanisqatsi, is a visually-stunning non-narrative film depicting a life and world out of balance. Koyaanisqatsi is a Hopi word meaning one of five things: "crazy life, life in turmoil, life disintegrating, life out of balance, and a state of life that calls for another way of living." After watching this film, one will definitely see all five definitions painfully applicable. Basically, the first fifteen to twenty minutes of the film has some wonderful shots of the desert, waterfalls, geologic formations, clouds billowing so close it's as if one's inside them, and aerial photography that makes one appreciate the landscape. The rest of the movie then shows the human side. Caterpillar tractors lay out pipes, dotting the landscape with a network of electric towers, resembling wire framework travesties of men, power plants billowing steam and smoke smack in the middle of the desert, atomic tests in the desert, nuclear plants... abominations invading the environment. Rivers have been stopped by dams. And the military testing in the desert does nothing more than pollute the ground and air with explosions. Switch over to the big city and the 12 lane highways, with its network of overpasses, byways, merging lanes, cars moving bumper to bumper, passing each other. Then we see the decrepit slums, abandoned projects, which are then blown up, slowly sinking to the ground in clouds of dust. The time-lapse photography of people milling in line for subway tickets, eating, bowling, playing video games, etc. shows the city as the organism, streets, entrances and exits as blood vessels, humans as the blood cells. The night scenes of traffic, with white and red dashes zipping is very telling, as is the cycle of traffic going, stopping, going, stopping at each signal light. Later on, the speed of the film goes quicker, to demonstrate the quickening rate and insanity of human consumption, waste, and stress. Is this really worth living for, I ask you? There are some images that are analogous. An aerial view of the concrete jungle, at what we've created, is replaced by an infrared satellite photo, then a closeup of a computer chip, showing the inputs going into multiplexers and demultiplexers, coming out as outputs. It shows how mechanized we have become compared to the more serene, less chaotic ways of nature, going in one way, going out through another. Another is a shot of sausages being cranked out, followed by people moving up escalators. Notice the similarity? The most telling shots of the thousands of people in New York, Los Angeles, or San Francisco is that they don't look very happy at all, but for them, it's what they know, what they are, part of this mechanized, corporate world. The translation of Hopi prophecies sung in the movie follow the conclusion, and they are sobering and chilling: "If we dig precious things from the land, we will invite disaster." "Near the Day of Purification, there will be cobwebs spun back and forth through the sky." "A container of ashes might one day be thrown from the sky, which could burn the land and boil the oceans." Philip Glass's score, which alternates from frenetic synthesizers during the time-lapse footage and elegiac sobriety in the slo-mo shots, adds to this one-of-a-kind movie. However, this is best seen on the big screen for maximum impact.
Rating:
Summary: Great film finally available on DVD!
Review: If you've never seen this one, you're in for a truly unique experience. No dialogue, no characters, no conventional plot. Music. Images. Hear me out, here!! The film starts off with nature shots against a slow tapestry of horns and winds. Eventually, we interfuse the nature shots with those of technology; dumptrucks working the land, airplanes in the sky. Eventually, the photography and music get faster and more electric, till we wind up with images of New York City streets sped up 200% give or take. Behind this is the grandest, most energetic and spectacular music Philip Glass has ever composed, bringing us to a pinnacle of sublime excitement. Atlthough there's no 'plot' to give away, I will not give you the ending lest you lose the fun of EXPERIENCING IT FOR YOURSELVES!!
Of course, if anyone but Godfrey Reggio and Philip Glass had done this film, it would've been disappointing. After all, we've all seen Baraca. Nature images, music; still, this is the original. So many films, just like Baraca, have imitated this one and even after one viewing, it will not be hard to see why! Although, on the 'DVD speical feature' interview, Reggio did offer one peice of advice for viewing. He mentioned that if, while watching, the viewer is asking herself why she's watching this, she will not enjoy it. So, yes, I suppose it takes 30 or so minutes to warm up to- as these are the slowest moments of the film, both visually and musically- but once you're there, it may just capture you!! One complaint about the DVD. The music, even though touched up from the original soundtrack has WAY too much reverb. On the 'vessels' cue, the keyboard reverb COMPLETELY drowns out the vocal. I listened back to my CD soundtrack and even that doesn't have but half the reverb of the film. Although it doesn't come close to ruining the film, it's definitely a pain. Here's a minor gripe. The Philip Glass Ensemble redid the soundtrack in 1998 and I know they toured with it that year, playing it synced up to the original film. I was REALLY hoping they would actually use the new soundtrack, as it would line up perfectly. They did not. Instead, we have to learn to live with the old one laced with careless reverb. Oh, well!! For all that, still five stars!!
Rating:
Summary: Amazing
Review: This movie is amazing. It's not for everybody or for everyday viewing, but it is truly an experience. In life, there always seem to be those moments when the clouds look just perfect, or the sky, the horizon, the mountains, something around you looks more alive then you've ever noticed before. Even though, at that moment, you fumble around with you camera trying to save the beauty you see for posterity; the pictures never come out looking like you remembered. Somehow, this film managed to catch all of those moments and I am forever grateful.
Rating:
Summary: koyaanisqatsi
Review: I saw this movie my senior year in highschool, back in 2002. I can honestly say that i have never been moved in such a way by a film as i have been by Koyaanisqatsi. It is unfortunate that so many people my age don't take time to seek out other things aside from whats on the surface of popular trends. The film is great because it lets you interpret it in any way you like. To me, it showed how nature is at a standstil in comparison to the constant move of human life and technology. Nature doesn't have to remodel or update every year to keep up with people. We have moved so high up above it we forget its there, and without it, we can't exist. I will say this, you have to have an open mind in order to truley appreciate this film. Otherwise it will blow right by you and you wont understand it.
Rating: 
Summary: Painful
Review: Well, I might be bucking the trend of glowing reviews for this 22-year-old "arthouse" flic, but here goes: While I recognize that the production was ahead of its time in 1982, and elements have been imitated over and over again --with very good results-- by many other filmmakers, I cannot in good conscience recommend this film. When my wife and I sat down to watch it, we honestly didn't know what to expect. I had *heard* of the film, but didn't know what it was about. With apologies to Seinfeld, it is basically about nothing. Yes, it starts out with dramatic footage of beautiful scenery overlayed with some haunting music (Native Americans chanting "Koyaanisqatsi" over and over again), but my FIRST comment to my wife was: "This looks like file footage." In my attempt to watch the movie without knowing anything about it first, I hadn't realized that it was 22 years old. It looked like file footage because it WAS essentially file footage. More to the point, the cinematography looks dated. As the film continues, the beautiful natural scenery is supplemented by scenes that have been dramatically sped up, or dramatically slowed down... images of human activity are generally shown sped up. While some of these scenes were effective in conveying the idea of "Life Out of Balance" (which is what "Koyaanisqatsi" means), I thought that most of them were way too drawn out. As for the soundtrack, unlike most people I absolutely love ambient electronic music. Most of the time. But not in this film. Finally, I'll just say that my negative opinion of this film has nothing to do with a general dislike of 'artsy' films. I thought "Winged Migration" was wonderful. "Whale Rider" was fabulous. "Rabbit-Proof Fence" was incredible. I just thought "Koyaanisqatsi" was painful.
Rating:
Summary: Amazing Cinematography
Review: More than anything, this is a beautiful movie. It is difficult to judge this movie on anything else because although the title is a commentary on modern day life, the actual movie works on more levels. The director has admitted that the movie has no real theme and you would be wise not to pull your hair out trying to figure it out. While it is partly a movie about "life out of balance," the director admits it is also a movie about the "Beautiful Beast" of technology and some of the most beautiful shots are of the urban landscape. Even given that the theme of this movie is not altogether coherent, I recommend this movie highly as one worth owning.
Rating:
Summary: Do you understand the message of the film?
Review: I was 14 years old when I first watched the film. It has been a year now. Only now after watching the film a hundred times do I truly understand it. For some one to say that they dissliked the film, they would be very wrong. Did you watch the film, or did you lisen? Perhaps that is why no one speakes in the film. You have to put it in your own words and not just sit there like a puppet and have someone tell you what they what. This is the whole point of the film. Koyaanisqatsi shows how mankind is starting to destroy the world. Buliding bombs and having people work like robots. This is how we live day-to-day. I want to thank the author for such a great job on the film. This film truly moved me. I think that this film should to given to high schools to show students what the world is becoming, and how it is up to them to make a difference.
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