Drishti – Santa Barbara Yoga Store: Yoga Clothing, Workout Clothes, & Yoga Supplies

by Craig Rawlings

Enlighten Up! tells the story of young Nick Rosen – the raffish and somewhat skeptical journalist – and his adventures in a six-month long experiment aimed at turning him on to yoga’s deeper levels by the film’s director Kate who is a devoted yoga practitioner.  It’s sort of a Pygmalion-type story set in the yoga world.  In Shaw’s play (and its many derivatives such as “Pretty Woman”), Professor Henry Higgins bets he can transform Eliza Doolittle (the lower-class flower girl) into an upper-crusty lady through his crash course and accent coaching.  In Enlighten Up!, the film director makes a bet with herself and the audience that she can turn Nick (the conflicted rationalist) into something of a yogi through heavy doses of guru-led insight and sweat on the yoga mat.  It’s a fun if not somewhat contrived setup.  Unfortunately, Kate boxes the film into being something less interesting and satisfying than it might have been had she just breathed, focused on her drishti, and allowed the film to evolve beyond its initial shape.  This is supposedly a documentary, after all – and that generally entails being open to the unexpected.  Kate doesn’t seem to hear the insights of the gurus as they respond to Nick’s questions; and it is perhaps her failure to change (or to document her change) that makes the film kind of a letdown.

Kate is to be commended for choosing Nick.  He is a sympathetic and engaging personality.  He is articulate and seems to approach the experiment gracefully and earnestly.  He awakens early and takes to the yoga mat.  He travels far and wide to meet both known and unknown teachers and gurus, who offer both sagely and wacky advice.  (Unfortunately, sometimes the most sagely teachers are given the shortest amount of airtime.)  Nick takes it all in stride and this is often enjoyable to watch.  He asks many excellent questions, and in the process of questioning and practicing, he grows as a person (and as an asana practitioner).  But Nick is a fact-based kind of person, and his experience does not make for tidy answers for Kate and her understanding of transformation.

The drama of the film is therefore really about both Nick and Kate.  While we learn to sympathize with Nick, Kate remains a distant and sometimes nagging figure.  The film would make more sense if Kate was more central, and we saw her transform over the course of the film.  What in her life led her to yoga?  Why is she making this film?  She presents herself as different from Nick, but how so?   Apparently, like Nick she has her own need for facts; otherwise, why make a documentary seeking to support some personal theory she has that yoga can transform anyone, even poor fact-based Nick?

As a documentary about yoga, we are given some memorable interviews, but we find the credits rolling shortly after the film starts to get truly interesting.  There are many loose ends, and a general missed opportunity to go deeper into the complexity of yoga.

It is after several of the gurus and teachers cast doubt on the film’s premise – not directly so much as in their answers to Nick’s questions – that there is an opportunity to celebrate yoga, even in all its complexity and mystery.  For example, Kate gives Nick only six months to experience spiritual transformation and obviously wants identifiable results; however, in an entertaining scene with the venerable BKS Iyengar, Mr. Iyengar emphatically stresses that it took him a full eight years to move beyond the physical to a deeper yoga practice.  The best moments in the film come when gurus and teachers attest that yoga is a life-long practice; outcomes are uncertain; there are many paths for many types of people; spiritual insight comes in many forms; and dedication and practice may be more important than spiritual insight per se.  These moments call into question the brevity and narrowness of Kate’s experiment and the possibility of even knowing whether it was a success or failure.  We are left to ask, what does Kate want from Nick anyway?  How is it different from what someone handing you a pamphlet at your door wants from you?  Rather than confront the difficult issues raised by these most senior teachers, the film abruptly changes course.  This is unfortunate, because the audience is poised to go along with Kate beyond the pretense used to get the film rolling and to acknowledge that the practice and philosophy of yoga is much more complex than imagined at the film’s outset. 

After watching the film, non-yoga folks are likely to be more confused than ever about all the yoga buzz and perhaps even turned off by seeing our protagonist brow-beaten by the director on occasion.  Yoga devotees are likely to be inspired by some of the interviews and asana footage – but if you are hoping for a film that will help translate some of the deeper aspects of yoga to a broader audience of family and friends, this is probably not it.  Ironically, Kate, who is the main yoga advocate in the film, comes across as rigid and strangely unreceptive to going beyond her initial assumptions about the practice of yoga.  As a yoga documentary for yoga practitioners, it has some good moments; but as a larger story about the road to spiritual transformation, we would need to begin by seeing Kate ask herself “what was I thinking?” in order bring about a satisfying conclusion.