Visionary filmmaker Godfrey Reggio’s latest is instantly familiar in style: a wordless montage propelled by a hypnotic Philip Glass score and Reggio’s startling command of imagery. Yet the substance here is less certain.
Foregoing the globetrotting scale of his classic Qatsi trilogy, Reggio turns inward to make the human face his subject; mostly, this consists of high-contrast monochrome close-ups of people (plus one gorilla) rapt in concentration.
The result is undeniably beautiful, oddly moving... and quickly tiresome.
Too empty to arouse insight and too samey to sustain excitement, Reggio’s best hope is that audiences will fall into a communal trance before they fall asleep.
