An American travels into Bhutan in search of a valuable antique rifle and crosses paths with a young monk who wanders through the serene mountains, instructed by his teacher to make things right again.
REVIEW:
The Monk and the Gun is a Buddhist comedy about knowing and doing the right thing in the modern world. This movie will not fulfill the Chekovian theater maxim that a gun must go off once it has been shown.
The lama here faced with the prospect of democracy in a millennium old monarchy realizes that a symbolic burial of all the violent and deadly elements inside all men must come if the fledging government is to be based on Buddhist principles. The democracy coming on the abdication of the king is Bhutan, and it’s the year 2007. So a mock election is conducted to show these mountain citizens how to cast a ballot.
The decree for the young disciple monk to get a gun, shoulder it, carry it, avoiding all temptations to sell it is an allegory of what it takes to purge a community of violence. That is confronted by the craven American capitalist who seeks only to add the gun to his large stockpile of antique weapons. Capitalism and the violent impulse it engenders in those focused strictly on the material is satirized . The introduction of democracy is approved, however— it get only a featherweight bit of satire. In a world where material dispossession is valued currency has no worth.
The lama and the monk are both bonafide Buddhist. The citizens are authentic. The main actors are nonprofessionals. The politics is familiar and toothless. Only the story is contrived. And the director maybe paid.
The lama is wizened and prone to gnomic comments, with the expected whispy white beard and heavy on the meditative poses. The monk is sturdily built, young, and eager to please. The guns will set things right, the lama insists. What he means by that is saved for the last third of the movie- the eternal Buddhist lesson that will be taught through action.
The film is leisurely paced and filled with lush shots of the mountain and fields. The American gun buyer is Ronald Coleman, waggishly named after the star of Frank Capra’s Lost Horizon, an Orientalist fantasy about a diplomat who crash-lands in the Himalayas, finds Shangri-La and meets a high lama played by the American actor Sam Jaffe. The American is stupid and greedy, a capitalist and colonialist caricature. But he has the ability to see beyond himself, learn, see and feel.
Every one easily sees through him, humors him and in the end gives him back his much desired gun in exchange for two with more lethality- a better symbol for violence to be buried under two tons of cement along with other possessions that hold them back.
The Monk and the Gun gets a B+. It’s streaming on Hulu.
CREDITS:
Directed by
Written by
Pawo Choyning Dorji
Produced by
- Pawo Choyning Dorji
- Feng Hsu
- Stephanie Lai
- Jean-Christophe Simon
- Janee Pennington
Starring
- Tandin Wangchuk
- Deki Lhamo
- Pema Zangmo Sherpa
- Tandin Sonam
- Harry Einhorn
- Choeying Jatsho
- Tandin Phubz
- Yuphel Lhendup Selden
- Kelsang Choejay
Cinematography
Jigme Tenzing
Edited by
Hsiao Yun-Ku
Music by
Frederic Alvarez
Production
companies
- Films Boutique
- Dangphu Dingphu: A 3 Pigs Production
- Journey to the East Films
- Tomson Films
- Closer
- N8
- Wooden Trailer Productions
Distributed by
- Films Boutique (worldwide)[1]
- Impact Films (Indian subcontinent)[2]
- Pyramide Distribution (France)[2]
- Roadside Attractions(North America)[3]
Release dates
- September 1, 2023(Telluride)
- October 17, 2023(Bhutan)
- February 9, 2024(United States)
- June 26, 2024(France)
Running time
107 minutes
Countries
- Bhutan
- Taiwan
- France
- United States
- Hong Kong
Languages
- English
- Dzongkha
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