Synopsis
This short-term crowdfunding campaign with DAF is for $5,720 AUD. Your support will go towards the licensing fees for archival footage used in the film – footage that would otherwise be lost to the public.
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SYNOPSIS
The Beloved is a portrait of a group of individual spiritual seekers, all of whom once followed a mysterious calling and surrendered themselves and their way of life to a man and a belief in his vision. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh or Osho as he is now known, was a controversial spiritual teacher from India who took disciples or ‘sannyasins’ from all over the world during the seventies and eighties. The Beloved focuses on sannyasins and ex-sannyasins from the port city of Fremantle, Western Australia, where in 1981, the group established a large ‘satellite’ commune and ashram in the centre of town. The sannyasin living experiment set in motion fundamental changes to existing social structures and identities; new names, new appearance – orange and red clothing only – and a completely new focus: a ‘master’ and the promise of enlightenment. In their vision for a higher consciousness revolution, the movement experienced a spectacular and public rise and fall in the space of only a few years, with the sannyasin headquarters in Oregon U.S.A. and the satellite commune in Fremantle both collapsing. Many sannyasins found themselves lost ‘in the world’, left to deal with the fallout of having cut family ties, sold off inheritances, and dropped out of the wider community and workforce. This is an epic meditation on the audacious living experiment and untold aftermath of the Rajneesh sannyasins in Fremantle, told by sannyasins and ex-sannyasins in intimate and, at times, harrowing detail. It is a contemplative listening experience of different voices and perspectives, presented over the changing backdrop of Fremantle – its cyclical events, weather pattens and light – as well as rare or personal archive.
Story
THE BELOVED is a portrait of a group of individual spiritual seekers, all of whom once followed a mysterious calling and surrendered themselves and their way of life to a man and a belief in his vision. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh or Osho as he is now known, was a controversial spiritual teacher from India who took disciples or ‘sannyasins’ from all over the world during the seventies and eighties. THE BELOVED focuses on sannyasins and ex-sannyasins from the port city of Fremantle, Western Australia, where in 1981, the group established a large ‘satellite’ commune and ashram in the centre of town. The sannyasin living experiment set in motion fundamental changes to existing social structures and identities; new names, new appearance – orange and red clothing only – and a completely new focus: a ‘master’ and the promise of enlightenment. In their vision for a higher consciousness revolution, the movement experienced a spectacular and public rise and fall in the space of only a few years, with the sannyasin headquarters in Oregon U.S.A. and the satellite commune in Fremantle both collapsing. Many sannyasins found themselves lost ‘in the world’, left to deal with the fallout of having cut family ties, sold off inheritances, and dropped out of the wider community and workforce. This is an epic meditation on the audacious living experiment and untold aftermath of the Rajneesh sannyasins in Fremantle, told by sannyasins and ex-sannyasins in intimate and, at times, harrowing detail. It is a contemplative listening experience of different voices and perspectives, presented over the changing backdrop of Fremantle – its cyclical events, weather pattens and light – as well as rare or personal archive. THE BELOVED is a 260 minute film in three parts. The film is structured around voice and landscapes of present-day Fremantle, archival imagery and natural sound, and foregrounds the coming to terms with the aftermath of the movement and the experience of discipleship. Director Statement The style of this film has emerged out of the search for an adequate form to represent the complicated history of Fremantle’s Rajneesh sannyasin community. Firstly, as a means of conveying the intangible experiences described to me by sannyasins: of the early encounters with the movement and with the guru Rajneesh himself, and of the enigmatic concepts of enlightenment and discipleship. But most crucially, to contain and address this community’s fractured historical interpretations and troubled memory, while avoiding the didactic, sensational, or categorical.
Production Stage
- Development
- Production
- Post-production
- Completed
- Outreach
DURATION: 260 MINUTES
Issue area
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