Minimalism: A Documentary About the Important Things

I agree with and try to live in accordance with the central idea that this documentary is trying to get across - focus on the important things rather than on consumer objects. But this documentary was a disappointment - I didn't even get all the way through. It's light on content, repeating the same basic ideas over and over. And using the book tour as a central narrative was dull and made the documentary look like an advert for the book.

Instead, I would have loved to have seen other issues explored. How do different minimalists do it differently? Is minimalism just a way of having a nice low-stress life or do people use it as a basis for helping others? What are some practical ways of reducing costs? How do people blend it with other alternative ways of living? How have people lived minimally in history? Does it work better in a city or the countryside? etc.

I think most reviews here don't get the point. It's not supposed to give you a plan for how to live like a minimalist. This is a documentary made for people who don't already live minimalist and haven't done any reading on the subject. This could serve as a great wake up call for many and all Western materialists should watch it. It's like an easy introduction to the topic.

It doesn't do much for someone who already lives like that but so what? "I rather read blogs on the subject and bla bla bla", yeah okay sorry guess what? You are the egotistic hipster you so much like to mock. You don't need guidelines or blogs to live a minimalist life. To be able to choose minimalism is always a huge privilege as you can see in this documentary and I think this fact makes it easier for Western people to relate and absorb something from Minimalism.

I liked the message of the documentary. It argues that we don't need all the extra stuff that we are constantly collecting. This is obstructing us from things that really matter. You don't make space for that since consuming seems more fulfilling myopically and seems more urgent. There were examples of multititude of people speaking about apparels, home space, career related things which we just get hooked on to without rethinking if that is for us. The documentary didn't get very deep in the challenges of implementing it, or even the nuances and how several people have adopted it in their daily lives. There were traces of meditation helping, connecting with people, implementing this within a family or just your spouse. But it felt a little superficial. But overall I recommend it. The next time you are purchasing something, if this movie triggers a deliberation, then it has left a mark. It seems to have done for me.

I am in full and enthusiastic agreement with most of the ideas presented in this movie. That's why I found it so disappointing.

With the exception of Sam Harris, Juliet Schor and President Carter (clips from the bravest speech ever given by a U.S. President), the talking heads were cloyingly earnest and oh, so good!

And stop all the hugging...please!

I am one kind of person who live for more stuff, actually I care much about what people think, and of course what I own. When they compliment me for the success I got with those expensive stuff, I feel proud and happy but not for long. I keep buying stuff, to maintain the proudness about these. Afterall I realize people don't really care about what I got. The movie is somehow describe me, people may call they're crazy to go backward to the norm of society. Yes they do. But It's a good thing for us both in term of metal health and physical health when the environment get more burden from scare resources and pollution. And why this movie don't give any specific direction to minimalism and the purpose of it. I think it advice us to give be concentrate on each individual's important things. And that's what different between people. We can't tell exactly. We gonna find out our all ways. I feel grateful watching this. I will give myself a time to grow and become a minimalist, not because they ask me to or I admire them. But just because I'm tired of the way I used to live : Living for more.