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Kumaré

Play trailer Poster for Kumaré 2012 1h 24m Documentary Play Trailer Watchlist
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60% Tomatometer 25 Reviews 82% Popcornmeter 1,000+ Ratings
Lapsed Hindu Vikram Gandhi conducts an experiment, in which he poses as a guru and attracts a number of devotees, but unexpectedly finds that his followers are receiving genuine benefits from his deception.

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Kumaré

Critics Reviews

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Michael O'Sullivan Washington Post 09/07/2012
3/4
What started as a long, elaborate joke becomes a journey, both for Gandhi's students and for the filmmaker himself. Go to Full Review
David Lewis San Francisco Chronicle 09/06/2012
2/4
Your view of the film may hinge on whether you can accept the ethics of his fakery. Go to Full Review
Mark Feeney Boston Globe 09/06/2012
1/4
There's a Morgan Spurlock narcissism to "Kumar." It could just as well have been called "Super-Spiritualize Me." Go to Full Review
Jordan M. Smith IONCINEMA.com 02/09/2020
What Kumaré becomes is an astounding test of art's ability to transcend fiction in order to find momentous truths. The lesson? Become a believer. Go to Full Review
Stephen Saito Moveable Fest 12/17/2018
Kumare never has the excruciatingly awkward big laughs of a project like "Borat," but nor does it ever feel as cruel. Go to Full Review
Michael Atkinson In These Times 04/13/2016
The more he communes with them and hears their very real troubles and genuine hopes, the more Gandhi's clever faade seems, to him and us, unsustainable. Go to Full Review
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Audience Reviews

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Zentaur S 01/16/2024 (spoilers) . . . . . Our truth is whatever we and others acknowledge it to be. Kumare was very inspiring to me. he tapped into or at least researched a lot of valid things. at least as far as the movie went nobody asks him for any proof and a lot of people seem to get lasting valuable transformation My takeaway also was that he needed the path he took to feel safe embodying, in his words, his ideal self The fact that 10 out of 14 people stayed is huge and feels pretty aligned. The only outright lie he told was one that I feel isn't extremely consequential which was the place of his birth I'm very curious if he went to back to that way of living after the documentary See more 10/05/2018 Probably the best doc ever made See more 07/01/2018 at times I thought this might be a fake documentary because it gets borderline ridiculous. See more 02/14/2017 (Spoiler warning: watch the movie first) Many of the critics either didn't watch the whole movie or were so personally offended by what it demonstrates that they can't be objective. Nobody seems to challenge that this was a great documentary - informative, engaging, and new. The only reason they have left to hate it is to say it was unethical to make it to begin with. To that, I ask whether they finished the movie or not? In the last scene, virtually all of the movie's "victims" were delighted by the big reveal that he was a fake all along. Many of them already seemed to know that and they just didn't care. Which shouldn't be a surprise, since he told them he was a fake throughout it, too. Absolutely the best parts though are when he's meeting with other cult gurus and exposing their nonsense to what they assume is a safe audience who will believe anything. See more 12/28/2016 In Kumare, Vikram Gandhi wants to show the absurdities of Gurus and seeks to illustrate his point by becoming one himself. He goes all the way. The film is clever and sarcastic as hell. Its a filmed experiment with "truth" and "faith" showing the powers of manipulation - Guruism is absurd, Vikram Gandhi get discipels by inventing absurd rituals and bogus "spritual" ideology. Relgious people will probably dislike this film. The basic idea is simple and a little scarry. I recommend it. See more 10/23/2016 The Spiritual Illusion From Within Is Really A Fascinating Journey To Behold.. I Do Feel For The Participants In This Experiment, But It Is A Real Eye-Opener On How The Belief System Of A Person Can Be Melded & Swayed Any Which Way...Unless You Have A Core Self-Belief That Initially Questions What Is Being Told To You. The Harsh Moral I Would Say Here Is Taking Things Purely On Face Value Alone Will Always Leave You Open To Difficulty Later On. Thinking For Yourself Is A Good Thing. See more Read all reviews
Kumaré

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Movie Info

Synopsis Lapsed Hindu Vikram Gandhi conducts an experiment, in which he poses as a guru and attracts a number of devotees, but unexpectedly finds that his followers are receiving genuine benefits from his deception.
Director
Vikram Gandhi
Screenwriter
Eklavya Sakpal
Distributor
Kino Lorber
Production Co
Future Bliss FIlms
Genre
Documentary
Original Language
English
Release Date (Theaters)
Jun 20, 2012, Original
Release Date (Streaming)
Nov 18, 2016
Box Office (Gross USA)
$129.6K
Runtime
1h 24m
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