What The #$&! Do We Know!?

[Nyk]

The Bleep website had a Forum. I think it
began around February. I messed around there
quite a bit between May and September. There
was quite a lot of dissidence there.

Friday afternoon [10 Sept] there was a new
thread begun that was a rather stinging indict-
ment of JZ Knight [channel for Ramtha, who is
the basis of this film] and a challenge to her.

Within a couple of hours the Bleep Forum was
simply gone. The whole thing, vanished. No
explanation. Erased.

I guess the Bleep really hit that Fan.[xx(]

[Nyk]

To give you a picture of the enthusiasum/
fanaticism which this Blip film is generating,
here is a comment I pulled off of the website´s
guest book today (this person has gone 28
times...28 times?!):


Submitted by: Richard Bradley, age 62 from Playa Vista , California, CA on 09/11/2004 at 13:30.
I had been preparing a Brochure or my Workshop on Quantum Physics and Neuropsychology, when a friend in Seattle told me to "Stop Everything, until you see this film." After I accessed the web site and joined the Los Angeles Street Team to help publicize the film, I was invited to a preview on May 27th. I have told all my friends that "This was the most important week of my entire life." After the premiere in LA on June 18th, I devoted all of my time to the promotion of this movie! I didn´t sleep much for a month-but, I am now taking better care of myself. I have now seen "Bleep" 28 times (as of Sep 11, 2004). I will see it many more times. as I meet the most wonderful people following the completion of a showing. They are so happy, invigorated, positive about life. Now, I have added to my list of life-long friends-because of this marvelous movie. Thanks again Mark, Betsy and william!!

[Nyk]

Here is the review by Ebert, who, though not
loving the film, has written a review that
is itself provocative....



WHAT THE #$*! DO WE KNOW? / **1/2 (Not rated)

September 10, 2004

Amanda: Marlee Matlin
Jennifer: Elaine Hendrix
Elliot: John Ross Bowie

With appearances by David Albert, Joe Dispenza, Amit Goswami, Daniel Monti, Andrew B. Newberg, Candace Pert, Ramtha, Jeffrey Satinover, William Tiller and Fred Allen Wolf.

Samuel Goldwyn Films presents a film directed and written by Mark Vicente, Betsy Chasse and William Arntz. Running time: 108 min. No MPAA rating.


BY ROGER EBERT

Why does anything exist? How do I know it exists? What do I mean when I say "I?" It's convenient to pin everything on God, but if there is a God, he provided us with brains and curiosity and put us in what seems to be a physical universe, and so we cannot be blamed for trying to figure things out. Newton seemed to have it about right, but it's been downhill ever since. And with the introduction of quantum physics, even unusually intelligent people like you and me have to admit we are baffled.



"What the #$*! Do We Know?" is a movie that attempts to explain quantum physics in terms anyone can understand. It succeeds, up to a point. I understood every single term. Only the explanation eluded me. Physicists, philosophers, astronomers, biologists and neurologists describe their strange new world, in which matter can (a) not be said to exist for sure, although (b) it can find itself in two places at the same time. Time need not flow in one direction, and our perception of reality may be a mental fabrication.

Among the experts on the screen, only one seemed to make perfect sense to me. This was a pretty, plumpish blond woman with clear blue eyes, who looked the camera straight in the eye, seemed wise and sane, and said that although the questions might be physical, the answers were likely to be metaphysical. Since we can't by definition understand life and the world, we might as well choose a useful way of pretending to.

Sounded good to me, especially compared to the cheerful evasions, paradoxes and conundrums of the other experts. Only after the movie was over did I learn from my wife, who is informed on such matters, that the sane woman who made perfect sense was in fact Ramtha -- or, more precisely Ramtha as channeled by the psychic JZ Knight, who would seem to be quite distinctive enough without leaving the periods out of her name. And who is Ramtha? From Cathleen Falsani, the religion writer of the Sun-Times, I learn that Ramtha is a 35,000-year-old mystical sage from the lost continent of Atlantis. Well, weirder authorities have surfaced. Or maybe not.

"What the Bleep Do We Know," as it is referred to for convenience, is not a conventional documentary about quantum physics. It's more like a collision in the editing room between talking heads, an impenetrable human parable and a hallucinogenic animated cartoon. The parts have so little connection and fit together so strangely that the movie seems to be channel surfing. This is not a bad thing, but wondrously curious. There are three directors and I wonder if they made the movie like one of those party games where you write the first sentence of a story and pass it along, and someone else writes the second sentence and then folds the paper so the third person can't see the first sentence, and so on.

We meet many wise men and women from august institutions, who sit in front of bookshelves and landscapes and describe the paradoxes and inexplicabilities of quantum physics. They seem to agree that quantum physics accurately describes the universe, but they don't seem sure about the universe it describes. Perhaps the universe is going into and out of existence at every moment, or switching dimensions, or is a construct of our minds, or is mostly made of nothing. Perhaps we cannot observe it but only observe ourselves as we think we're observing it.

The experts do not know the answers to these questions, and admit it. They have quixotic little smiles as they explain why it is that there are no answers. What makes them experts? I guess it's because they have been able to formulate the questions, and intuit the ways in which they are prevented from being answered. Gene Siskel ended every interview by asking his subjects, "What do you know for sure?" These people know for sure that they can't know for sure. At some point in the movie I would have enjoyed, as a change of pace, a professor of French who explains he cannot speak the language, that perhaps nobody can and cautions us that France may not exist.

Intercut with their intellectual flailing (which is charming, intelligent, articulate and by definition baffled), we get the story of a young woman named Amanda (Marlee Matlin). She is a photographer who has many questions about her life. Many of these are the usual questions we all have, like what does my life mean, and why do I look like this in the mirror? She unhappily attends a wedding party at which people think they are dancing and having a good time, but may in fact be bouncing randomly through space and time without a clue. Well, most parties are like that, but what we don't suspect is that the subatomic particles in our bodies may be partying in exactly the same way.

To visualize this idea, the filmmakers use brightly colored animated blobs to represent emotions, tendencies, memes, engrams, delusions, behavior patterns, senses, and various forms of matter or energy, all wandering around the universe trying to get a drink or maybe meet someone. As we see how random everything is, how much chance is involved, and what the odds are of anything happening or not happening, we ask ourselves, "What the #$*! Do We Know?" And we conclude that we don't know s%&t.

That's where Ramtha comes in. Cathleen Falsani, who must have been taking notes while I was staring gobsmacked at the screen, quotes the 35,000-year-old Atlantean: "That we simply are has allowed this reality we call real, from the power of intangibility, to pull, out of inertness, action ... and mold it into a form we call matter." Like I said, Ramtha makes perfect sense. That I simply am a film critic has allowed this reality we call "What the #$*! Do We Know?," however intangible, to be molded into a form I call a movie review. Isn't life great?

Copyright © Chicago Sun-Times Inc.

http://www.suntimes.com/output/ebert1/wkp-news-what10f.html

[Krevency]

Roger Ebert, huh?  Just goes to show you that you should tell everyone about this movie, because you just don't know who will be interested.

I've gotta see it, and the showtimes are loading on my computer now.  Someone said there's a DVD coming out?  

Oh!  There's one in Seattle!  That's, like, an hour away.  I'll have to drag roomie down there, and maybe my mom, too.  Veeeery cool.

Great title for a movie, BTW.  Very provocative.

[Seven]

Anyone know if this film is coming to the UK?  I REALLY want to see it!

[Nyk]

I last read that it was early 2005 for international release.


Perhaps you might want to get on the Bleep mailing list:
http://www.whatthebleep.com/mailinglist/

Here is their most recent mailing of info (including
vague mention of international distribution).

quote:BLEEPING NEWS for 22 September 2004
-------------------------------------------------
We at What the BLEEP join you in celebrating a high holiday:

The Autumn Equinox

...when the forces of light and the forces of dark are in perfect balance.

(Also known as: Alban Elfed, Autumnal Equinox, Cornucopia, Feast of Avilon, Festival of Dionysus, Harvest Home, Harvest Tide, Mabon, Night of the Hunter, Second Harvest Festival, Wine Harvest, Witch´s Thanksgiving, and the first day of autumn.)

And we're feeling a bit celebratory here at BLEEP Central – our big National roll-out is doing well, holding over in all the theaters we opened in.
-------------------------------------------------
News Flash

We're up to $500,000/week at the Box Office, and $4M total. That means about ¾ of a million tickets have been bought.

Word of mouth continues to build and fill the theaters. The entertainment industry is starting to realize (a little slow...) that we exist.

We're adding theaters all the time. Including Canada! Also, opening dates in theaters sometimes move due to Chaotic factors in the phenomenological Universe so always check our Showtimes page.
http://www.whatthebleep.com/showdates/

International Distributors are calling. The Equinox is for the entire planet, and soon we will be too.
-------------------------------------------------
Speaking of the Media: it´s time for action!

Months ago we had resistence getting into theaters. Then everyone started making phone calls to theaters. Those calls made a huge difference, and now we can book just about any theater we want. Now it´s time to turn to the media. Newspapers, Magazines, TV, Radio. Why? Because the Media has not yet realized the Phenomena that is going on with respect to this movie. (Although really the Phenomena is what is going on with You, the audience.)

For instance, a lot of our viewers listen to the George Noory Show. George and his Producers saw the film and liked it but decided not to do a story. Who knows what a few hundred calls & emails would do.

There are many cities where we have played for 3+ months, yet those cities have not picked up the story. Why? They just aren't aware of it. So please call and write the media outlets. It´s harvest time – time to let them in on the... the...

The Phenomena

Indeed it is harvest time, and we are very pleased by the response from everyone. Below is a snapshot/review of where we've been. If calls to your friendly media hit a blank wall, read them this. Enjoy:

The Anomalies

The following are some bullet points about the film What the BLEEP Do We Know!?. Taken one by one they are somewhat interesting, but taken in aggregate they represent a phenomena unknown in the movie industry.

Film was self-financed ($5M) from proceeds from software products that William Arntz created.

Subject matter: Science – Quantum Physics, Neurology, Molecular Biology, and Spirituality, and how these effect You.

Cinematic form: Hybrid of theatrical drama & comedy, documentary, and special effects/animation.

Told by the industry from the studios to the distributors to the bookers to the theater owners that there is absolutely NO market for this film.

Ignoring the experts we self-distributed. Using the software notion of "proof of concept" we went one theater at a time, building up our numbers.

In our 2nd theater (Portland, OR) we played for 17 weeks, with over 60,000 viewers.

The theater owner had to move the 2nd show back 15 minutes because people would not leave the theater, instead turning to the person next to them and discussing what they had just experienced. (Other theaters report this also.)

Booked into major theater chains (Loews, UA/Regal) in premium locations.

Recorded extended "hangtime" in every major market we entered (and still playing in all of these): Tempe, AZ: 21 weeks, Seattle: 18 weeks, LA (Bev Ctr) 13 weeks, San Francisco: 8 weeks, Tucson: 17 weeks.

In Santa Monica on the Promenade, at the Loews Broadway 4, we opened in the #3 place. We kept moving up and after 5 weeks we moved into #1, where we've stayed for 4 weeks. Our largest weekend gross was in the 8th week.

In Denver, playing at the major UA/IMAX theater, in our 3rd week, we grossed more than the other 8 films combined (all first run studio fare).

We will gross $½ M this week playing on 65 screens. Ranked #25, 2nd highest per screen average of the top 30, beaten only by the #1 film.

Currently over $4M box office, with minor national media coverage (tiny Time Magazine mention) and very mixed reviews. All this to a market segment that the media still does not acknowledge exists.

Received official endorsements for Unity Churches, and Church of Religious Science. Have heard repeated comments from members of Landmark Forum, Cabbalists studies, Bahai Faith, Buddhists, Sikhs, Theosophists and many healing modalities that the film expresses exactly what they teach and utilize in their practices.

Received 4 emails from viewers about suicides that did not happen because they watched the film. (And thousands of other transformative stories.)

What the BLEEP is Going On?

[LogoRat]

http://whatthebleep.biz/
This is a link to a movie that i want to see.
I wanted to share the info.

---------
What Happens When You Combine Today's Cutting Edge Scientists & Mystics?

Can Science And Religion Really Be On The Same Path?
On The Same Planet?
In The Same Movie!?

Do You Surf The Quantum Foam?

Have You Been Waiting For A Film That Unravels The Quantum World?

Want To Bend Your Mind With Visionary Visual Effects And Animation?

What Is Quantum Physics?
What Is Spirituality?

What Are All Those Scientists And Mystics Talking About?
What Is Going On In My Brain!?

What The #$&! Do We Know!?

Well...
It's time to get wise...
------------

[mar10fl]

i saw this movie last weekend and i advise everybody to go see it. its really amazing and im glad this movie was made so more people can become cognizant of the possibilities out there.  

[SpectralDragon]

I just saw this documentary a while ago. This is the kind of thing you watch at the theatres, go out of the theatres, look into the sky, and say "wow." It really shows the basics of western mysticism and how science and mysticism are tied together.

[narfellus]

I love Roger Ebert. I don't always agree with the man. but he is extremely intelligent and articulate, and can give a mean Thumbs Up or Down. Yeah, i have to see this movie too.