Pondicherry, an ancient city near the Southern tip of India, was for several centuries an outpost of France. Now the French influence has faded but another, stranger, colony is growing on its outskirts--Auroville, a community of Europeans and North Americans who have come to live the contemplative life. They are devotees of Sri Aurobindo, a Bengali poet and mystic, and their guru is a ninety-four-year-old woman from France. This spiritual mecca is described in the film by Albert Jordan, a professor from Concordia University, Montréal, who, in 1971, with his family, spent a year there.