Can three guys kicking around the country with a mail-order video camera open doors on the wisdom of the universe?

It's beginning to look like a possibility to viewers of a low-budget film produced in Michigan by Ward Powers, an attorney, and friends Chad Munce and Scott Carter. They pooled funds for the $10,000 budget.

The filmmakers knocked on the doors of some of the world's most admired spiritual thinkers and — far more than they had any reason to hope — were welcomed with open arms and minds.

The trio was casting for answers to 30 profound questions, and they pulled in wisdom not only from those considered by many to be enlightened but from young people in places as far-flung as Detroit's Cass Corridor and Colorado's mountains.

The final film focuses on 15 questions, such as "What happens after you die?" "Describe God" and "What are we all so afraid of?"

The insights of the film coalesce in its title: "One," distilled from its working title of "We Are All One."

Powers said he believes the trio connected with so many famous people because "they all sensed the urgency of the message, that awareness of our oneness is the next step."

Munce (Powers' cousin) ran the camera, and Carter helped with editing and plays the role of a silent spiritual seeker. Perhaps the centerpiece of the film is the response of American-born Tibetan Buddhist monk and scholar Robert Thurman to the request: "Nonverbally, by motion or gesture only, act out what you believe to be the current condition of the world."

Thurman's solemn stare haunts the film. In one of the voice-overs describing the making of the film, Powers goes from wondering what Thurman is thinking, to fear that the inquirers are being dismissed, to realizing, "Oh, it's perfect!"

Those moments correspond to the steps of a spiritual journey, Powers said.

A variety of views

Everyone from fundamentalist Christians to people attending an atheist convention shared their views with the digital-camera-toting team, including:

• Thich Nhat Hanh, Vietnamese Buddhist monk nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

• Deepak Chopra, the New Age author

• Thomas Keating, a Trappist monk and leader in the contemplative prayer movement

• Ram Dass, whose spiritual journey included psychedelic drugs in the '60s and has continued through exploration of Hinduism, karma, yoga and Sufism.

Michael Fitzpatrick, who has traveled extensively with the Dalai Lama to produce a CD called "Compassion," sent permission for its use as background music in "One," along with a taped message from the exiled high priest of Tibetan Buddhism.

Information

Web site for "One": www.onethemovie.org/

Watch the trailers: www.onethemovie.org/film.html

"There are no answers in it. Everyone finds their own truth. At the end, the answers are yours," said Powers' wife, Diane, the fourth member of the filmmaking crew. "That's what we hoped to do: cast bread on the water and let people feed off it."

Ward Powers said he was surprised that "One" triggered "so many tears."

At a Michigan film festival, an older man told him: "You know what you've made here, son? You've made a cult classic. And you know who's the cult? Everybody from 8 to 87."

In Southfield, Mich., some viewers reserved a screening room to present the film to friends as a gift. One woman used it to celebrate her 50th birthday, and another to thank those who helped her through her first year of widowhood.

The idea for the film came to Ward Powers in April 2002, in a world rapidly separating into factions after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. "There was a sense the world needed to pull together," Powers said.

Diane Powers added: "We are all beautiful in our differences, [but] we had forgotten we belong to each other."

Powers and his friends had no prior experience as filmmakers. Now they're learning to meet the post-production demands of a project that's attracting hundreds of e-mails from across the country.

Optimistic about hooking up with a national distributor, Powers currently has his sights set on an eight-city tour to places such as San Francisco, Seattle, Portland and Boulder, Colo.