[CFF 2023] Review: Mind Body Spirit
Note: At the time of publication, both SAG-AFTRA and the WGA are striking AMPTP following breakdowns in contract negotiations for better pay and working conditions. In support of their cause, WSB will only be reviewing or promoting films that fall outside of the scope of the major studios represented by the AMPTP.
Finally, audiences will get to see the dark art of yoga for what it truly is. Coming into Chattanooga Film Festival, Mind Body Spirit, a found footage-style horror film about a hopeful yoga influencer, was one of the higher profile draws featured in the festival’s lineup. The film is the debut feature film from co-directors Alex Henes and Matthew Merenda and writer Topher Hendricks, with Henes and Merenda also sharing writing credits.
Mind Body Spirit opens with a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it framing device that aims to rectify one of the enduring questions in the found footage genre: “Why are they still filming, and who edited this together?” The first question is frequently answered by having one character insisting that another not stop the camera for posterity, but the second is rarely addressed. In Mind Body Spirit, however, the brief opening, in which the camera slowly zooms into a laptop—its browser open on a VPN along with several playlists of disturbing files and footage. The unseen user opens a search for “mind body spirit,” clicks the result, and the film begins.
I love this opening, solely because in no uncertain terms, it hints at the rarely acknowledged but inevitable truth, were this footage to be found in the wild—it would undoubtedly find its way onto the dark web, where any number of prospective filmmakers might find it, cobbling together the most interesting pieces that point to their dark conclusion. It’s an effective, efficient solution that deserves mention.
The film itself documents the timid Anya (Sarah Bartholomew) as she tries to make a fresh start, having spent all of her savings making the cross-country move to her newly inherited house, left to her by her maternal grandmother, who she has never met. When she finds what appears to be her grandmother’s holistic manuscript (but might be more of a grimoire), Anya takes it as confirmation that her yoga dreams are meant to be. The deeper she falls into her grandmother’s rituals, however, Anya is forced to admit that perhaps the soul that she’s enriching through the practice isn’t her own.
Bartholomew is excellent as Anya, taking hold of the mousiness of the character, hoping to let her enthusiasm for fulfillment shine through her newly created channel. Anya is many millennials in today’s digital age—struggling to steady themselves in a rapidly shifting, churning current that has never slowed down enough for them to find their balance in the first place. She sees her inheritance as her first (and only) real opportunity to take a big risk to reap bigger rewards. Not only can she realize her influencer dream, but she can do it while rediscovering her family’s ancestry and culture, which she feels was robbed from her by her mother’s estrangement from her grandmother.
The film takes a fair amount of notes from Hereditary (2018), but also, seemingly, Incantation (2022) which may be more of a coincidence than intentional, but the comparisons put Mind Body Spirit in great company. From the former, we see a deceased family member set events into motion in order to pursue their ill intent from beyond the grave, and from the latter, dark ancestral practices are used without fully (or even partially) understanding their meanings. By combining the two angles, the directors are able to close in on Anya from two sides: her desire to find personal meaning through her vlog, and the guilt and anxiety she feels toward cultural appropriation and erasure.
At one point, Anya’s much more successful friend, Kenzi (Madi Bready), stops over to give Anya pointers on the vlog game and to shoot a collaboration to boost her friend’s fledgling channel. When Anya shows Kenzi the book with enthusiasm, hoping to tie it into her channel as something to help her stand out, Kenzi is nonplussed, instead suggesting she “make up some yoga flows,” and “pepper in some Sanskrit,” saying that “people don’t really care as long as you seem authentic.” It’s the kind of statement that, in this kind of movie, rarely ends well for the character.
Sarah Bartholomew as Anya in Mind Body Spirit. Image courtesy of Art Brut Films.
One thing that didn’t sell me is the disembodied movement of Anya’s camera. Several times, the camera turns, moves, or even lifts from its mount and is carried around the house, by—presumably—the spirit? I’d like to think there would be a better reason for this to happen than to make sure the audience sees what the directors want us to see, but it’s hard to come up with one. There aren’t any moments where Anya reviews her footage and realizes that someone else has moved the camera, capturing spooky goings-on that she hadn’t been aware of. There’s no streaming audience joining us in shouting at the television for Anya to get out of there. It’s a strange choice that I feel could have been circumvented a number of ways—a second camera, for instance.
Where Mind Body Spirit shines, though, is when it pulls back and lets its smaller details glare out from behind the veil. Its scariest moments are its subtlest—a door, ever so slowly, swings open, or a shadow rises in the reflection of sunlight on the floor. That’s not to say there aren’t plenty of disturbing scenes front and center, either. One scene in particular still has me squirming as I write this. But there’s a balance to how the film highlights the darkness surrounding Anya and how it presents the ways the darkness invades her home. It’s an unsettling quietness that hangs over every scene; an unspoken understanding that Anya, try as she might, does not belong there.
If the calmness and serenity of yoga gives you the energy and mindset to start your day, then Mind Body Spirit will certainly disrupt your morning meditation. It’s a fresh take on some increasingly common anxieties, which is just where I like my horror to be.
Article written by Ande Thomas
Ande loves the intersection of sci-fi and horror, where our understanding of the natural world clashes with our fear of the new and unknown. He writes about monsters and foreign horror and can also be found over on Letterboxd.
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