The bushmen people of the Kalahari and an old man !Gubi are the survivors of a profound tale in how humanity can live one with nature and one with themselves.
From the documentary we learn: '!Gubi is one of the last remaining lion shamans. He dances for hours in a circle around the small fire. In the dance the !Num, the spiritual energy boils within the dancers belly and burst forth at the point of Kia. Kia is an altered state of consciousness that links the dancer to the universa life force. This state this energy has for long been used to access the spirit world, to bring rain, to control animals but most of all to bring healing.'
The honesty and sensitivity displayed by director, writer, narrator, Lianne Cox is a direct path to an honest and sensitive understanding of who the Bushmen are.
In the documentary she narrates : “To numb our fear of the unknown, we desensitize ourselves to the miracle of living. We perpetuate the non-chalant lie that we know who we are and what it is. Yet behind this preposterous bluff the mystery remains unchanging waiting for us to remember. It waits in a shaft of sunlight, in the thought of death in the intoxication of new love, the joy of childbirth or the shock of loss. One minute we are going about our business as if life is nothing special and the next we are face to face with profound unfathomable breath-taking mystery. This is both the origin and the consummation of the spiritual quest."
"On my journey I found we are the mystery of God manifesting all that it is. There is no self and there is no other. No subject and object. All is one. With this realisation we find ourselves no longer separate from others or indeed with anything we dissolve into mystical communion. We are in lone with all beings. With this wisdom one enters into the trance and becomes the trance dancer."
Lianne has spent many years (approx 12) getting to know !Gubi and this bushmen family of the Kalahari. And this documentary is a family portrait of XE XARRA XE the South African motto, translated to mean UBUNTU.
!Gubi the story of the Bushmen offers a visual monologue to the one-ness of the human existence and icludes a remarkable encounter with the white lions of Timbavati.
As we come face to face with the breathtaking natural scenery of the Namib and the Kalahari we come face to face with the communities, families, leaders, healers, musicians and children of the Bushmen people and their lifestyle at one with the animals and plants of their environment. We see how their children grow completely at one with dance and celebration and therefore one with themselves.
The practice of UBUNTU, music and love is seen in the participative gatherings of the bushmen people. Their lives are tough but good. They are at ONE, ONE with themselves, our earth and our COSMOS.
When this music is expressed it finds itself in harmonic resonance with the all, an energetic whole humming in vibrations of light, life and love.
This experience transcends the duality of the earth existence whereby modern society (as opposed to the ancient way of the Bushmen people) have pushed the boundaries of nature.
I once saw a French film, BlueBerry directed by Jan Krounan. The battle scene is extraordinary : The Antagonist and Protagonist had pursued and chased one another throughout the film only to land at the feet of a Red Indian Holy Man in the deepest canyons of the desert region.
It is here that the holy man humbly administers them with a healing concoction of some deep significance. The two men promptly fall into the unconscious where their awareness travels into the infinite bounds of the spirit world. Here the spirit does battle within and of itself to a point of resolution. And thus through the power of cinema we see an almost tangible impression of a world or a reality that exists beyond our 3 dimensional impressions of a conservative human existence. We enter a portal of understanding of the spirit world.