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Kelsey Bulinski-Sparks
Professor Jennifer Williams
Eng. 101
Oct. 9, 2014
The great Jacqueline Woodson once said Diversity is about all of us, and about
us having to figure out how to walk through this world together (Brainy). The movie
Baraka was directed by Ron Fricke in 1992. It was filmed in over 24 countries and
during a phase of 14 months (Spirit). The movie starts off showing a picture of
mountains and the music is tranquil. It than soon goes from tribe to tribe, religion to
religion, fast beats to slow beats, showing all different types of lives. The pictures move
up and down to all around panorama with different music, helping to depict the mood
the director is trying to get the audience to feel. Traditional ways of life are compared to
modern ways of life. Baraka means having spiritual presence with God and how he
flows through physical objects, places, and people (Dictionary). Overall, this film is
about the four basic elements and how people of different backgrounds and religions
live and let live in order to become closer to God.
The four basic elements are Earth, Fire, Air and Water. Each of them represent a
different part of nature and play a different role. Throughout the entire movie this theme
is displayed. According to, the website Spiritual Knowledge, Water is often nurturing
and sustainable (Baraka). This movie often portrays scenes of water a lot. It shows
how people of different cultures use it. Some use to either bathe or wash clothes or how
it is just naturally apart of where they live. In India the reason the people bathe in the

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Ganges River because it is a holy river and water purifies the soul and cleanses the
body (Baraka). Water is essential and water puts out a good fire. As seen in the movie
Baraka, Fire can be used as ceremonial sacrifice to burn bodies (Baraka). The method
that is shown is called pyre and the people of India use this method on the Ganges
River to put their loved ones to rest. Not only is fire used for funerals but it was also
used in devastating ways like during World War II. Millions of people died from just
combat and from concentration camps as shown in Baraka. The director Fricke uses air
and the earth in a general way as well in this film. Oxygen is all around and it allows
human to breathe. For the meaning of Baraka when it says God is within all people,
things, and place it means the air, the very oxygen humans breathe in. As inferred from
the movie this might be why a lot of ceremonial events are taken outside in the heart of
Earth and Mother Nature herself. It involves simplicity and wholeness. There is a sense
of unity when in nature. It makes a person feel whole and apart of the scene. Thats how
the elements are within and they allow one to be better in tune with the world and
mostly importantly with God for some individuals. These elements can also connect
people to their culture.
A persons background is like their cultural, its their upbringing, a way of life.
There are hundreds of different cultures around the world. Each one being different from
the next. For example, in the movie it goes from people in the middle of nowhere to
people in busy cities (Baraka). When compared the Ashanti tribe in Africa is completely
different than lets say the people of the busy city of Tokyo. To say the people of Tokyo
arent as religious as the Ashanti tribe is an untrue statement. Both places and people
worship a god one might just be more in tune with it than the other. They have

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different focuses in their daily life but at the end of the day have a willingness to praise
someone. As also seen in the film, Fricke, the director focuses apart of it in Auschwitz,
Poland (Baraka). The people who were held in the concentration camps here were
there because of religious reasons and culturally different backgrounds. It is important
for people to be aware of this event that occurred during World War II because it shows
that even though many of the countries involved had a diverse group of cultures they
could still come together as one and stand up for diversity. Baraka shows a variety of
individuals and the religions practiced by each. One powerful scene that supports this
idea is when the Buddhist Monk is walking slowly through a busy Japanese town ringing
his bell (Baraka). The scene puts in comparison quite easily the new and old difference
and ways of the world. It signifies the cultural difference in todays world and how some
cultures havent changed and some have. How some people have adapted to the new
ways of the world and some havent. Baraka is good about showing this difference
through the transitions and visual effects. An extremely good example of this is the
constant image of a solar eclipse (Baraka). A solar eclipse represents the word baraka
it symbolizes the light behind the dark, the wholeness, the spirituality of the people, of
religion and of the mighty Mother Earth herself. Every human being on this Earth can
see the stars and the moon, half the world can all look it at in the same moment and
thats something really special. It can all go back to the idea of diversity and a blessing a
disguise so to speak. The moon covers the sun disguising it allowing darkness to
appear and lightness to be hidden, just like a bad day or a bad memory but it only last
for a split second eventually transforming back to paradise. Some things just happen

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that no one has any control over it is not a bad life, its just a bad day. That is why we
have to live and let live.
Sometimes we just have to live and let live. Humans live for the purpose to
satisfy themselves and to do things for themselves and their people. Thats why its
important to live a life that one enjoys because a person only lives once so it might as
well be one that individual enjoys. People have a way of living and some of that involves
prayer, meditation, or simply just working. One scene in Baraka shows a huge factory
of women who are sewing. They do this to make money and to earn a living for
themselves and most likely their family as well. The company that hired them does this
to make money for the business and to pay its employees. The world has evolved and
is always evolving. Thats why people look to religion and to live and let live. For
example, there is the scene of the little girl in the Amazon hiding away in the bushes
and then there is the scene of little kids running through the slums of Rio. Its brilliant to
compare those of the same country. It shows that even those these little kids are
impoverished they can still make it and that they are living their lives to the fullest. The
little girl in the bushes symbolizes that as a society is important to evolve, to grow and to
learn. She is young but learning and is understanding. She will grow up to be what her
culture has taught her because that is her life and simply there is nothing left to do but
live and survive. One example that also can be looked at in the Kecak dance in the
forest in Bali (Baraka). The people do their monkey chant to relive an important event to
them. Some humans could look at them and judge but thats their life and their belief
and they arent harming anyone so be it. To live and let live is merely to say let those

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people live their lives the way they want to, whether poor or rich, in the forest or in the
city.
In conclusion, Baraka is about how people of different cultures and religious
backgrounds, live and let live through the four basic elements in order to become closer
to God. The world is full of a various types of individuals and it is important to preserve
that. It is important to be aware of the multiple types of cultures and the day to day
rituals they face in order to gain a new perspective on the world and respect it. As noted
before it was ingenious of Fricke to spend fourteen months filming various groups to
inform and allow his audience to interpret this visual presentation for themselves. He
definitely added a new perspective on the world and opened the eyes of many people.
He succeeded greatly without words and only the use of pictures, images and music.
From the transitions to the music to the angle of the camera, Fricke achieved a
satisfying story. It isnt what is said but what is seen. Actions speak louder than words
and words may actually speak but a picture is worth a thousand words. Those
thousands words say so much more.