Kundun

This is an extremely ambitious project that tries to tackle very complex and profound philosophical and spiritual subjects. The film fails to impress one as a comprehensive account of the Dalai Lama's life (and I don't think it was meant to be one, although various reviewers have commented on how the movie "fails to deliver the goods"). Kundun, in my opinion, needs to be viewed as a cinematic (audio-visual) exploration of the Tibetan spirituality and the cycles of existence - birth, death, reincarnation - a continuity being preserved physically and spiritually while rejuvenating mind, body and spirit generation after generation, or if you will, cycle after cycle. Consider too, the title Kundun, by which name the Dalai Lama is called. The word literally means "a presence". In an ephemeral world, is this a reference to the one constant cosmic presence or guardian spirit that presides over Tibet, inhabiting a succession of Dalai Lamas even when the physical presence is itself in exile far away from Tibet?

To approach Kundan as a docudrama or biography of the 14th Dalai Lama would be to deprive oneself of the appreciation of the visual metaphors illustrating the paradoxical aspects of Tibetan Buddhism, or for that matter many Eastern spiritual concepts. Scattered images of the Tibetan sand painting mandalas occur in the movie at critical points in the narrative. These ritual paintings are made with great care and reverance and routinely "swept up" just a few hours after they are created. The coloured sand is collected and dropped into a river or stream where the spiritual elements inherent in the mandala are symbolically returned to the earth to rejuvenate it. This process is a metaphor for life itself : Nothing, however precious or beautiful, is permanent - yet even after it has been "destroyed" in one form, it retains the capacity to rejuvenate and be reincarnated in another. The editing in the scene where the colours in the dismantled mandala reflect the colours of the robes of the lamas in the stark landscape of the plateau with the sacred mountains in the background as the sand is dropped in the stream is one of the the most poignant sections of the film. The imagery not only emphasizes spiritual concepts but also serves as a premonition of events yet to transpire. Even as the Dalai Lama grapples with the spectre of Chinese control of Tibet, his own safety, the loss of Tibetan culture and religion, his duty to his people, and the possibility of living in exile - the vivid fleeting interspersed images of the mandalas remind us that nothing is permanent - only that there is hope of rejuvenation and rebirth. Similarly, the scenes of the funeral rites involving the vultures is yet another way the theme of life and death is explored. (The symbolic and spiritual aspects of the mandala paintings are beyond the scope of this review but interested readers can find information on this subject at various web sites or libraries).

This is a multi-layered and multi-dimensional presentation of a complex subject. The experience of viewing this film will no doubt be enriched by familiarizing oneself with background information on the various facets of Tibet - its culture, its history and politics, spiritualism and Buddhism, and a fundamental appreciation of Eastern concepts dealing with the non-permanence and cyclical nature of life and death.

Kudos also to the cinematographers for creating the illusion that this film was set in Tibet when, in fact, (if the filming locations listed are to be accepted as accurate,) the film was shot in Canada, USA and the farthest East the film makers went was Morocco!

As additional background, Arthur C. Clarke's short story about counting the names of God will also shed some light on interpretation of Tibetan beliefs. This movie is recommended to all those who have the patience to look beyond the obvious and attempt to comprehend the obscure.