Probably the foremost reason why most people are disappointed with this
movie is because it's a Martin Scorsese movie, without anything about
it that screams out Martin Scorsese. It probably was simply a subject
he had a real interest and love for, which blinded him it seems. Sure,
it focuses on its main subject but everything surrounding it gets
completely ignored it seemed, which made this movie mostly a
disappointing watch.
Don't go watch this movie expecting to learn everything about Tibet,
Buddhism or the Dalai Lama. Seriously, after watching this movie I
don't feel like I have learned anything. It doesn't explain anything
about the religion and rituals, or tells you what the Dalai Lama is all
about and what he stands for. It actually made this a very shallow
movie experience, which I never could feel involved with. The only way
I could see this movie being interesting, is if you are already into
the subject and have some basic knowledge about it.
For a movie with a subject such as this one has, it's surprisingly
lacking depth. You would expect the movie to be filled with ancient
wisdoms concerning spirituality, knowledge and peace. Absolutely none
of that present in this movie. It simply follows its main subject
around and that's it really. Evertyhing that happens around him and
every story aspects that potentially could had been interesting gets
handled poorly and all remains very underdeveloped.
Another thing that felt wrong about this movie was its acting. The
movie uses non-professionals of Tibetan descent, forced to speak
English. If first of all feels wrong to hear them all speak English but
next to that, the acting itself from most of the actors is far from
anything too impressive.
No, it's not like I hated this movie. After all, it remains perfectly
watchable but it never got interesting or involving enough in any way.
What saves it is that it's still a technically well made movie, that is
great looking as well. Most people will praise the cinematographer or
director for this but in some cases, such as this one, you should
simply give most credit the natural environments. I mean, I don't think
it was possible for the film-makers to let this movie look ugly, even
if they tried really hard to do so.
Too distant and shallow to call this a great or recommendable movie.
6/10
Watch trailer
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