“Sorrow does not come merely from contemplating death, which forces us to look into Eternity, but also from life, which compels us to confront Time”, wrote the Russian philosopher Nikolai Berdyayev. The renowned Lithuanian documentary maker Audrius Stonys has taken these words as the motto for his film, a meditative visual essay which portrays old people undertaking all kinds of activities, meditation and group laughter therapy. Without a single word of commentary, he creates from sophisticated, aesthetic images a compelling study of human corporeality which, in an ideal union with spiritual equilibrium, can sustain us with the pledge that old age doesn’t have to be a painful wait for the last breath. Uku Ukai does not ask the viewer to understand, but rather to enter into synchrony with the sounds and images. Uku Ukai is spiritual gymnastics: bodies run, breathe, reach out without needing to reach anything. While images flutter and sounds ricochet, the viewers become the real film. Inhale, exhale.
