| credits containing: ray harryhausen years: 1890-2010 |
4.Spiritual Warriors (2006,USA,99mins) rare good:YesYES - Drama, Fantasy/Sci-Fi, Horror • guy in trouble gets his life together with past life revelations from a personal guru: An arrogant out-of-work actor in Los Angeles named Christopher Finn is delivering drugs for his crime boss friend Joe to make some money. When he's pursued by the cops, he finds shelter in the palatial home of a funky old guy with a long white beard named Roger. In Roger's presence, Finn has past-life flashbacks to other times when he was pursued and killed, as well as an earliest memory of being in Atlantis with a gentle King who was his father and a beloved sister named Athena. Finn leaves stunned, and begins to act different. He tells his girlfriend Claire that Roger was his father, he tells Joe that he's quitting drug running (earning him a beating), and he's discombobulated at his acting class, where his coach tells him to stop hiding his emotions. Roger then takes Finn to Egypt for an initiation process by spirits, which takes the form of dramatic visions, atop a pyramid, in a desert where a Pharonic mystery school existed, and at the cliffs of Petra, where Finn sees himself getting hanged with another boy for stealing. Finn returns jovial to America dressed like an Arab, spouting love and interfaith wisdom. Claire is upset. Finn realizes that Joe was the boy who got him hung, and thus embraces Joe with forgiveness when he comes to shoot Finn. Finn is critically wounded, but in the hospital has a near-death out-of-body experience in which he sees that Claire was Athena. Finn returns to his body miraculously healed, then introduces Claire to Roger, who helps the two reconcile some conflicted past lives and realize their full love for each other. Finn had a vision of a space city with a little boy he loves, so he knows good future lives are ahead as well. But soon Claire dies, and Finn is depressed until he decides to move into Roger's mansion and study spiritual practices with him. Finn becomes able to work with energies, and goes with Roger to the desert where they face the devil who killed the King in Atlantis. The Prince of Darkness kills Roger, but Finn triumphs and visits Roger in heaven before returning to Earth to continue the spiritual warriorship, which involves making confident choices about where to focus internal attention even when the external reality is distracting. • spiritual action flick crosses genres for mystical adventures in episodic plot: Whenever you see a highly ambitious independent film like this, complete with a special effects budget bigger than many entire indies and some well-known people contributing their talents, you can be sure there's an interesting story behind the scenes. In this case, the producers are at least as metaphysically intense as the film itself, which raises expectations (and responsibility) for the movie's impact and message. The lead actor Jsu Garcia co-wrote the script with executive producer Dr. John-Roger, a financially successful spiritual leader whose organization the Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness (MSIA) was founded in 1968 and to which Garcia has belonged for over twenty years. This pedigree brings to mind the relationship between the New Age hit "What the Bleep do We Know?" (2004) and the spiritual leader JZ Knight, who channels discarnate teacher Ramtha, who consulted the Bleep's filmmakers on how to make the money that they should then pour into that project. Now, Dr. John-Roger started life as just Roger Hinkins, born to a Mormon family in 1934, but in the 1960's he immersed himself in numerous California subcultures, including New Thought spiritualists and the yogi-derived Eckankar teachings of Paul Twitchell. Roger clearly had his own internal source of inspiration too, since in 1963 he had a near-death experience from a car accident which left him with heightened psychic powers. The source of these powers led Roger to his own higher consciousness which called itself John the Beloved, implying that Roger is the reincarnation of Jesus' disciple St. John. And why not? There's an Oregon businessman turned spiritual leader named Nick Bunick who says he's the apostle Paul, and he has yet to make a movie (Nick's the guy who does the tricks with seeing 444 everywhere to indicate the presence of angels, ie. spirit guides, which could make for some dramatic cinema).www.MysticalMoveGuide.com - All Original Writings Copyright © Carl J. Schroeder, All Rights Reserved. Images Are The Copyright Property Of The Respective Owners/Studios And Were Obtained Through Public Channels And Are Not Intended to Infringe On Any Copyrights