After Little Buddha and Seven Years in Tibet this is the third movie about the Dalai Lama and Buddhism in general which I've watched recently. The one thing they all had in common was that they were all stunningly beautiful, especially Kundun. The movie was filled with shots which were fit to be framed and put in a museum. But that's about all there was to the movie!! Cool shots accompanied by vague Buddhist sayings about life, death and enlightenment, and a flimsy storyline about the Chinese invading Tibet. For some reason all the acting seemed static and thus you slowly got the feeling you were watching a documentary or an educational program instead of a real movie.
I think Scorsese made this movie out of his interest for Buddhism and to give everyone an idea of what it's like. In that he succeeded superbly, but as a movie Kundun misses something. It's the constant disturbances in the story line with visions, shots of sand paintings and Buddhist sayings which keep you from being pulled into the movie. The movie is more like a big, long commercial for Buddhism. In beauty Kundun surpasses both Little Buddha and Seven Years in Tibet, but as a movie Seven Years in Tibet is far better.
I think Scorsese made this movie out of his interest for Buddhism and to give everyone an idea of what it's like. In that he succeeded superbly, but as a movie Kundun misses something. It's the constant disturbances in the story line with visions, shots of sand paintings and Buddhist sayings which keep you from being pulled into the movie. The movie is more like a big, long commercial for Buddhism. In beauty Kundun surpasses both Little Buddha and Seven Years in Tibet, but as a movie Seven Years in Tibet is far better.