film

In 1991, filmmakers Ritu Sarin and Tenzing Sonam made The Reincarnation of Khensur Rinpoche, which followed the search and discovery of a 4-year-old reincarnated lama, Phara Khenchen Rinpoche. Sixteen years later, the directors revisit the reincarnation at Drepung Monastery in South India. The film offers an intimate look at the life of a young lama as he aspires to live up to the reputation of his former incarnation. It also explores his moving relationship with the two people closest to him, his attendant and his spiritual master, both of whom were connected to him in his previous life.

Choenzey is a 47-year-old monk living in a Tibetan refugee monastery in South India. His spiritual master, Khensur Rinpoche, a revered high lama, has been dead for four years. According to Tibetan belief, he will soon be reincarnated. It is Choenzey’s responsibility, as his closest disciple, to find the reincarnation and to look after him. The film follows Choenzey’s search and his eventual discovery of an impish but gentle 4-year-old boy who is recognized by His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan State Oracle to be the reincarnation.

Why hasn’t Tibet been freed? Who is keeping the movement from going forward? From director Dirk Simon, When The Dragon Swallowed The Sun is a groundbreaking documentary that examines these questions in a quest to understand why the world is still dealing with unsettled issues like the Tibetan cause and what can really be done to eradicate them. Seven years in the making, When The Dragon Swallowed The Sun is the first inside look at the Tibetan movement to free Tibet from Chinese occupation, its internal conflicts and contradictions.

After 50 years of Chinese occupation, Tibet has lost most of its unique history, culture, language, and spiritual way of life. More than a million Tibetans have died under the Chinese occupation as a result of torture, starvation, and execution. Today, Tibetan people are denied most rights guaranteed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights including the rights to self-determination, freedom of speech, assembly, movement, expression and travel.

On the Eastern Tibetan plateau of Kham, at an altitude of 14,000 feet, subsistence farmers and nomadic herding families sprinkle the craggy mountains of Nangchen. Their way of life has changed little in over 2,000 years, and for most it is a life of illiteracy, poverty and hunger.

Kino Aero         18th of April         20:30

The debut feature from the preeminent Tibetan filmmaker working today. The Silent Holy Stones is a restrained, unhurried story of a 10-year old Tibetan monk who has the chance to spend a few days at New Year with his family in their village a day’s horse-ride away. The boy’s journey to his village and back to the monastery bring to light the intertwined forces of westernization and consumerism that are a powerful presence even in a small Tibetan farming community.

Karma, a Tibetan filmmaker from New York, goes to Dharamsala, the Dalai Lama’s exile headquarters in northern India, to make a documentary about former political prisoners who have escaped from Tibet. She wants to reconnect with her roots but is also escaping a deteriorating relationship back home.

Kino Aero              20th of April 2012        18:30

Kino Aero              20th of April 2016        18:30

Kino Aero               20th of April 2012        18:30

Kino Aero               20th of April 2016        18:30

Kino Aero         19th of April        20:30