a ideia é ótima, a execução mediana. mesmo assim, dá pra tirar umas pérolas dali do meio (e provavelmente a minha pérola vai ser bem diferente da sua haha).

I recognize the problems with the documentary--that the filmmaker somewhat forced her philosophies and bias onto her subject--but I think that adds to the film, seeing that it is in fact a documentary. The filmmaker and the subject getting frustrated with each other, that's reality, and that's what I look for in a documentary. The story was very transparent, and the filmmaker was willing to admit that she was wrong in some ways. The fact that the subject was skeptical throughout the movie gave it more value. I don't want a movie that is preaching to the choir, I want something that challenges my thoughts and my beliefs.

A quaint, quick, and interesting documentary showing several varying approaches to the vast and deep world of yoga. It may not necessarily lead to anything conclusive, all things considered, but it certainly does enough to get you thinking without being forceful or pandering.

Not Real eventful just some guy globetrotting around the USA and India finding the meaning of Yoga..Really enjoyed it though.

This was entertaining even thought the film maker was annoying, the subject was engaging and Iyengar's interview is badass...

a somewhat enjoyable doc about a guy seeking to get in touch with his spiritual life through yoga. he pretzels up with california strippers to yogis in india, and everyone in between. interesting, but at the end of the day he's just not a very likeable dude and that definitely brings this one down. the yoga looks AWESOME though.

A lighthearted look at why we love, hate, do, do not do yoga. Namaste!

Felt that this was a so so documentary, the main subject and filmmaker are kind of whiney, this was eh..for me

Filmmaker Kate Churchill has been making documentaries for nine years and practicing yoga for seven years. For her latest film "Enlighten Up!", she has combined the two in deciding to show a novice being transformed spiritually by yoga which also helps the body.(For Diamond Dallas Page, it is all about the body.) Her guinea pig, Nick Rosen, is a 29-year old journalist who is at a crossroads in his life, having just quit his job.(It might help if he gave up smoking, too.) It is good that an enthusiast like Kate Churchill has made this film since she has a lot of respect for all the different interpretations(My personal favorite is the giggling guru since laughter is the best medicine) that all collide in an inward focus, blotting out the outside world, allowing the practitioner to fully contemplate her soul. That's especially important in New York City, which I just read is the most stressful city, where their journey starts with a single step and continuing, as they collect a lot of frequent flyer miles, to meet with many a guru. In the end, "Enlighten Up!" is an illuminating documentary, maybe just not in the way originally intended.

I got the feeling she was developing feelings for Nick and they weren't reciprocated. even I felt the kick in the stomach when he wanted to take the "cute girl" out for a night on the town. funny how Kate insisted the camera was coming. stopped that dead in it's tracks.

Excellent documentary, a reflection of life while learning about yoga. Kate achieves enlightenment! because she shows us how different we are and yet how similar we are all - the only thing that matters in the end is that we are happy, no matter how we get there. I believe Kate and Nick are happier people because of their struggles, and i enjoyed the honesty this film carries. After watching it, i thought maybe its the tittle that mislead yoga fans into not so great reviews. Upon some reflection, the tittle is perfect. This film is directed to those that think they know what yoga is, and dont accept other views, including that where yoga might simply not make someone happy. Enlighten Up! I think this documentary is brilliant: honest, interesting, educational, intelligent, real. Thank you Kate.

looks interesting....

A reasonably satisfying little documentary that features a surprisingly profound ending where there very well could have been an empty climax. The thing people have to get about this movie is that yes, the main character Norman Allen is quite a bit of a skeptic. Yes, he's probably a yuppie who was thinking "this is bullshit" through about eighty percent of all of the yogic practices that he tried to perform or understand. That's the way he was as a real person, and I know that it got kind of annoying when he kept repeating to himself like a mantra that he didn't believe in anything besides the grand and mighty Concrete and Empirically Proven things of the world... but at least he wasn't pretending to be all in awe of something he really didn't care enough about to believe in. And Kate Churchill, while forcing this guy to explore his own inner world, seems to have some doubts of her own. She even admits that she is the camera person because she didn't have the guts to make his journey herself, so she's just going along and watching him try out all these funky headstand poses and listening to these swami-types who have a lot to say on the matter. And we have to admit, a lot of these hardcore gurus seem a little nutty. If you're not in on that crowd, they seem so totally dedicated and unreachable. Part of me feels as if this is something you either get or you don't, and Norman will have to figure this out the hard way. He smiles and nods to all these people, and what they say actually does make a lot of sense, but the real understanding just isn't there. The shock comes when, at the end of the movie, he meets a guru who finally makes him stop and think. This guy, with the extra holy beard of a sage and the sense of humor to go with it, simply said: figure out what makes YOU happy. It might not even be yoga! Just do whatever it is, and do it well, and you're set for life. A lot of people, including me, have had to re-learn this bit of information over and over. Norman probably did too. The advice almost overwhelms him, and he doesn't really speak that evening while traveling across the river. I'm willing to bet that he was trying to tell himself to enjoy yoga, or at least be awed or flabbergasted by it, and it just wasn't working - and here this guru is, who finally lets him know that that's completely okay. It was a powerful moment, a climax that I did not really expect to come from a documentary that could very well have ended with his badly hidden disappointment... or some flimsy pretend revelation. Hearing back (is it a year?) after the documentary has been completed, we find out that Norman has taken up work involving rock climbing. So that's what it was that he really liked to do! I think all along he was just seeking permission to go ahead with it. It's kind of obvious to me that Churchill is disappointed by the fact that his life was not transformed by the divine art of yoga the way she wanted him to be, but I'm divinely happy for Norman. Having found what it is he wants to do, I'd say he's pretty lucky as it is. She, however, needs to do some more soul searching it seems... and that's why I hesitate to say that this movie is one hundred percent satisfying. We see Norman open up to making the choice between what he wants and what he thinks he should want, but Kate's insistence that yoga 'keeps me whole' sounds a bit forced. Or defensive. I'm not sure. It is odd that the subject of the documentary is not what I question here but rather the documentarian. I loved the scenes of India and the quest for personal truth. I have to admit I oftentimes that I related to Norman and his nagging doubts. I think a lot of viewers have. Wherever you are on the scale of enlightenment, this is definitely worth a watch.

gives ignorant westerners like me a better understanding of yoga...and how obscenely the american middle-class, new agey, self-empowerment set have bastardized and commercialized it.

Enlighten Up! is one female documentarian's attempt to seduce a hipster New Yorker thru her camera. She fails. Kate Churchill, who has been doing yoga about as long as I have, drags her boyfriend(?) to half the yoga studios in New York, intent on finding the right instructor with whom her sole subject, Nick, will click. Apparently, she wants to be there, camera at the ready, when Nick receives something akin to enlightenment. (I guess she missed the part about enlightenment generally taking a lifetime to achieve?) My biggest problem with the film is her subject, Nick, who apparently would rather be knocking back PBRs in a dark bar in Williamsburg. He starts out as simply the Voice of Skepticism but turns into Mr. Super Whiny somewhere over the Pacific. In fact, Nick's grating passive-aggressiveness doesn't kick in until AFTER Churchill's hauled him all the way to India to meet some of the stars of the yoga world. Not into yoga? Gee, Nick why didn't you just say 'no' in the first place? Maybe because you knew this docu gig would include all-expenses excursions to Hawaii, Los Angeles and all over India. And it comes with two-hours of Nick's tiresome self-deprecation in front of a hand-held. He was right about one thing: this film would have been far more 'enlightening' had it just been Churchill chronicling her own immersion in a world and spiritualism we Westerners still know so little about.

Not Real eventful just some guy globetrotting around the USA and India finding the meaning of Yoga..Really enjoyed it though.

A documentary in the style of Super Size Me with a very different focus. Appropriately, you come away from it with a seemingly yoga-like feeling of being both more enlightened and less enlightened about yoga, but not less informed. Whether it's the way of yoga or not, it is the way of documentary to be open about what you're trying to accomplish and displaying both the successes and failures in that attempt. The film definitely does that. It's drawbacks mostly have to do with not filling in background facts, which makes it more of a documentary for people already knowledgeable of yoga. I get the feeling I missed out on a few laughs and insights because the film didn't properly setup the punchline.

yoga does change life...without us noticing....one realizes that when enters that world deeply and than exits it.....and, as it says in the movie "don't accept Krishna!...yoga is not about changing your religous believes but about making you better person, first toward yourself and then, indirectly, toward the others....."if you want to change the world, change yourself"

all my yoga students need to watch this and discuss. homework. lol

This really is a fantastic movie. It is real, and manages to be both funny and charming, while widening up the scope of contemporary yoga culture for the audience.