5/10
Simple stories, not that special though
19 June 2005
The comments I read on this movie about scenery and vista are a little over stated. Some Buddhist life philosophies come through - but take a lot of time and film to make simple points. The movie is good, but it could have been a lot better. Some scenes were shot in the same place, eg: you see the same part of the creek/river as they move slowly along a dirt road to Thimphu. The movie is filmed along a roadside as five people travel to Thimphu. A Buddhist monk tells them stories to pass the time; and then ,cut-in scenes of the Buddhist monk's story are seen(by the viewing audience)on film. A continuity-goof appears in this movie, the Buddhist monk disappears from the back of the truck, only to reappear again in the next scene. I was told by other commentators in this forum to go and see this movie on the wide screen, for its grandeur etc. but I felt a bit disappointed, it could have waited for the DVD to come out. I was hoping that the travelers could have reached Thimphu, I would have liked to see the city and its people. This story/plot reminded me of many other movies I have seen, rural person sets out to go to the big city, gets an education along the way.

At the end scene, I was waiting for Dandup (the main character) to walk back along the road towards the young girl that he had fallen for. I think the director/writer missed a big opportunity here to serve the audience's expectations.

As is my nature, I became suspicious that a large sports runner/jogger company had sponsored this movie; Dandup's runners are constantly shown. I understood that the director was demonstrating the clash of culture thing of Dandup wearing these runners in a Bhutan culture, but there were far, far too many shots of the runners. The movie could have been called, "Dandup's runners".
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