Short Film Review: "Do I Exist: A Riddle" Is A Dreamlike Meditation On Life After Death
Written and directed by Indian filmmaker Dhruva Harsh, Do I Exist: A Riddle seeks to combine René Descartes’ philosophy “Cogito, ergo sum” (“I think, therefore I am”) with Buddhism to explore the possibilities of life after death. Equal parts Christopher Nolan and Terrence Malick, the film questions the notion of reality by filtering its narrative through these philosophies, culminating in a thought-provoking and dreamlike meditation.
A short film comprising René Descartes's philosophy "Cogito, ergo sum" (I think, therefore I am) and "Buddhism" combined. This work of fiction is the manifestation of dream and death or life after death. It's about existing as a 'being' or not.
The opening lines of the Dhammapada, the collected sayings of the Buddha, read: “We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts we make the world.” Both Buddha and Descartes, who famously wrote “I think, therefore I am,” reason that because there is thinking, there is a thinker; however, they see this relationship in opposite ways. For Buddha, the act of thinking is what makes the thinker real; for Descartes, the thinker is real prior to the act of thinking.
It’s these opposing ideas that Harsh twists into an ambiguous meditation about two worlds — the one in which we exist physically, and the one that exists within the mind (or “heart,” as the film phrases) — and which one is more real. The dilemma our protagonist, Siddhartha (Anurag Sinha), faces is trying to answer this self-professed riddle as he remembers his past life. Stuck in the “maya” (or “cosmic illusion”), Siddhartha is caught between life and death, forced to relive memories that could be construed as comfort or torture. His self-doubt and uncertainty of true existence are the primary forces that drive the film forward, but his terrestrial ties serve as a means of conflict.
Utterly confused between life and death, dream and reality, Siddhartha forgets time and place and keeps dwelling in the same house where he lived with his wife, Marvi (Nancy Thakkar). The central catalyst for the film’s otherworldly exploration — Siddhartha’s apparent suicide over his Marvi’s refusal to carry a baby because she’s not ready — is a bit too melodramatic and soapy to be taken seriously, but there’s joy to be found in the journey toward transcendence. The dense philosophical musings, which are delivered exclusively through voiceover narration, are occasionally elusive and difficult to grasp, but the emotional core of the piece is strong and resonate.
The film is full of rich and vivid cinematography. Harsh has a clear eye for composition; there’s a spareness to them, a use of negative space, that reflect Siddhartha’s feelings of being lost (or longing to be found). Harsh makes good use of repeated imagery to bring the jumbled, non-linear story into clearer focus. His use of slow pans are effective and give the film a nice, even, ethereal glide, but the sequence where Siddhartha transforms into the Monk stands as the definitive visual highpoint. The editing is a bit off at times — particularly in how it illustrates Siddhartha’s revelation that he’s no longer living. The pops and flashes of the clues which have been sprinkled along the way (which are almost Memento-esque) are a bit too rapid and jarring to mesh with the smooth glide of the rest of the film. They aren’t exactly necessary for the viewer and may have been better illustrated through stronger, more emotive performances.
Does Siddhartha accept his death and transcend, or does he step into an Inception-like “false” reality of his own design? Do I Exist: A Riddle poses this question, but it smartly refuses to communicate a solid answer, leaving it up to the viewer to decide. It’s an interesting experiment that boldly seeks to answer some of life’s more difficult questions. It’s well-crafted, but a bit too narratively murky at times, making some of its more profound ideas hard to follow, but it’s definitely nice to bask in the film’s slow, otherworldly atmospherics.
Recommendation: If philosophy and explorations of life after death are your thing, definitely give Do I Exist: A Riddle a whirl.
Rating: 3.5 monk transformations outta 5.
What do you think? We want to know. Share your thoughts and feelings in the comments section below, and as always, remember to viddy well!