This is a true story and the second feature film from writer-director Pawo Choyning Dorji ( A Yak in the Classroom, which showed at last year’s Perth Festival).
Dorji’s films have been made with little funding in Bhutan – one of the remote places on earth. It has no film industry, and was the last country to open to TV and the Internet. It has a traditional culture of Buddhism.
In 2008 the King of Bhutan abdicated in favour modernity and a democratic election. The people were not accustomed to expressing their opinions, so election supervisors were sent around the country to set up mock elections, to teach them how to vote. Many did not even know their birth date.
They were shown how to vote by colour – red for industrial progress, blue for equality and justice, and yellow for preserving the past with the King’s authority. Yellow was the winning colour.
The village lama (who actually plays himself in the film) asks a monk (Tandin Wangchuk, a Bhutanese pop star) to acquire two guns as a matter of great importance before the new moon in four days’ time. The guns he says are to “set things right”.
At the same time an American gun enthusiast (Harry Einhorn) with seemingly unlimited money arrives with a driver-interpreter (Tanden Sonia) looking to buy a rare Civil War rifle – owned by a monk who is not interested in the fortune offered to part with it.
It is beautifully filmed by Jigme Tenzine using equipment that had to be brought in from India. The actors are local villagers from Ura. Dorji is a wonderfully talented photographer and film-maker who has never been to a film school.
This warm-hearted story about tradition and change has many surprises, and pokes fun at American democracy.
It is a delight!
107 minutes.
Spoken in Dzongkha and English with English subtitles.
Show at Somerville Crawley until Sunday December 22.
Watch the trailer…
