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Spiritual Cinema

"Movies containing spiritual, metaphysical, conscious or similar messages or themes". Simon Keyes explains the idea behind Spiritual Cinema. It is the extraordinary power of cinema, high or low, serious and exploitative, to move and disturb us that we should celebrate and embrace in all its diversity. Films can fertilise our inner lives and provide a counter-balance to that compartmentalisation of our "religious" selves that Thomas Merton dubbed our "personal holiness project". The feelings and shadows that films (well, perhaps not quite every movie) incarnate in us give us privileged access to the world beyond our immediate experience. The sights and sounds of cinema can resonate in the realms of the unconscious and the archetypal like no other medium, and there is much for us to learn about ourselves in this experience. Below is a list of "the best of" this genre...

The World Of Apu ( Apu Trilogy Part 3 ) (1959)

8.3/10
Director: Satyajit Ray
Starring: Soumitra Chatterjee, Sharmila Tagore

The third of the famous 'Apu trilogy' although 'World of Apu' stands on its own as a brilliant, artistically meaningful film. Told in a straight forwa... Read more

Thirteen Conversations About One Thing (2001)

7.1/10
Director: Jill Sprecher
Starring: Matthew McConaughey, John Turturro, Clea DuVall, Amy Irving, Alan Arkin

Engrossing, mosaic-like, philosophical drama follows a hot-shot attorney, a nebbish professor, an insurance company middle manager and a cheery maid w... Read more

THX 1138 (1970)

6.8/10
Director: George Lucas
Starring: Donald Pleasence, Maggie McOmie, Robert Duvall

George Lucas' first feature film is a thought-provoking look at a future society where robot police keep humans drugged and forbid any form of emotion... Read more

To End All Wars (2001)

7.1/10
Director: David L Cunningham
Starring: Robert Carlyle, Kiefer Sutherland, Ciaran McMenamin

Tells the true story of four Allied POWs who endure harsh treatment from their Japanese captors during WWII while being forced to build a railroad thr... Read more

To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)

8.3/10
Director: Robert Mulligan
Starring: Gregory Peck, Mary Badham, Brock Peters, Phillip Alford, Robert Duvall

Gregory Peck won an Oscar for his portrayal of Atticus Finch, the defence lawyer of a black man accused of rape in the American South. Scripted by Hor... Read more

To Kill a Mockingbird ( Blu-ray ) (1962)

8.3/10
Director: Robert Mulligan
Starring: Brock Peters, Gregory Peck, Mary Badham, Paul Fix, Phillip Alford, Robert Duvall...

Gregory Peck won an Oscar for his portrayal of Atticus Finch, the defence lawyer of a black man accused of rape in the American South. Scripted by Hor... Read more

Truly, Madly, Deeply (1991)

7.3/10
Director: Anthony Minghella
Starring: Juliet Stevenson, Alan Rickman, Bill Paterson

A winning, heartfelt, darkly humorous account of a young woman, unable to get over the death of her cellist lover, who gets the shock of her life when... Read more

Unmistaken Child (2008)

7.7/10
Director: Nati Baratz

Witness an extraordinary individual journey in this touching, revealing look at a Nepalese monk's search for his reincarnated mentor. This beautifully... Read more

Vanilla Sky (2001)

6.9/10
Director: Cameron Crowe
Starring: Tom Cruise, Penelope Cruz, Noah Taylor, Kurt Russell, Jason Lee, Cameron Diaz

Director Cameron Crowe's re-working of the 1997 Spanish film 'Open Your Eyes' (inspired by a Philip K Dick novel, 'Ubik') stars Tom Cruise as a charmi... Read more

Waking Life (2001)

7.8/10
Director: Richard Linklater
Starring: Wiley Wiggins, Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy, Steven Soderbergh

Director Richard Linklater's innovative cartoon odyssey uses live-action footage overlaid with matching computer animation to create an experience as... Read more