7pm, Regal 4
Director: Graham Coleman
Writer: Graham Coleman
Cinematographer: David Lascelles
Running Time: 134 min

Four years in the making, Tibet: A Buddhist Trilogy played to international acclaim following its initial release in 1979. Hailed then as a masterpiece, the original version of the meditative documentary clocked in at nearly four hours. It returns now in a digitally restored, re-cut edition that runs just over two hours. In three parts, the film patiently unwraps the details of daily monastic life and brings you face to face with the unbroken continuity of Tibet’ ancient culture.

The Trilogy opens with an exclusive look at the Dalai Lama’s residence in Dharamsala, North India, and in the re-built Sera Monastery, the second largest monastery of old Tibet. We observe the Dalai Lama in his dual role as Head of State and spiritual teacher. In an elegant cinematic style, at one with its subject, the film interweaves this personal portrait with an intimately observed exploration of the ways in which the inner knowledge of Tibetan Buddhist culture is developed in the monasteries, through vigorous debate and solitary meditation, and communicated in to the lay community.

With extraordinary authenticity, Part II of the Trilogy journeys deep into the mystical inner world of monastic life. Set in the ancient village of Boudha, Nepal and the isolated mountain caves of the yogis, the film follows the lamas of the Phulwary Sakya Monastery through their contemplative retreats, the building of an intricate cosmogram, and the performance of an ancient protective ritual known as “A Beautiful Ornament”. Through the ritual invocation of the female deity Tara, the malevolent forces that might bring harm to the society are invited and magically transformed. With a subtitled commentary based on the teachings of the great 20th century master Dudjom Rinpoche, the essence of tantric Buddhism is powerfully revealed.

The final part of the film, set in the majestic mountain landscape of Ladakh, is a meditation on impermanence and the relationship between the mind, body and environment. It follows the monks and farmers through a day, ending with an unflinching depiction of the monastery’s moving ritual response to a death in the community. As in the Tibetan Book of the Dead, the departed is guided through the dream-like intermediate state between death and birth.

Documentarian Graham Coleman has created an intimate journey deep into the heart of an ancient Buddhist culture, crafting an imtimate portrait that is both immediate and unobtrusive and which bears fair comparison to Robert Flaherty’s “Nanook of the North” and the documentaries of Fred Wiseman. Coleman writes “We were trying to allow the Tibetan way of life to speak directly to the audience … above all, we hoped that the film would draw the audience into the spirit of the Tibetan culture, into its light-heartedness, openness and quietly powerful awareness of the sacred.”