Kundun (1997)
As Reviewed by James Brundage
Withdrawal. It has to be withdrawal. This is now Day 2 of my lovely vacation and here I am thinking about it. No CNN. No printer. No Internet. And, come to think of it, no cheesy movies. I suppose, having become accustomed to the bad for so long, I have accepted them, learned to deal with them, and become addicted to the destruction of them in a well thought out review. I suppose its ironic that the film that makes me want to tear a film apart, that should make me learn that the bad films, the suffering, is a part of my life as a movie critic, should be one focused on Buddhism. And it's also ironic that it should stir the violence in my blood.
The film I'm talking about is Martin Scorscese's Kundun, the Dahlia Lama film of 1997 that was nominated for four academy awards but walked away with none (sadly). With a cast that no one's heard of it still managed to pull off what is becoming impossible: make a great film about a religion that is, for the most part, misunderstood. Make you sympathize with the Tibetans, and hate the Red Chinese, and, at the same time, illustrate the drama of the Dahlia Lama's early life.
It wasn't bad. No, in fact, the film itself was relaxing to watch, and a helluva lot better than Seven Years in Tibet, the other Dahlia Lama film that came out at about the same time. Not that it wasn't good to watch: no, sir, I'm left enjoying almost every frame, the beautiful photography of the film, the exquisite locations and vistas that it offered. It wasn't even the direction and acting in the film: they were fine, too. Dramatic content, writing, miscellaneous technical aspects that I don't even know why I bothered to learn the names of them. None of them have serious flaws. None of them annoy me in any shape, way, or form. What annoys me is that I have become used to, no, addicted to, the ripping apart in a film in my review.
And that's what I'm missing. I'm not just missing it; I'm aching for it. If I keep seeing films this good, all the time, with nary a bad film, then I will cease to function as a critic, lose my cruelty and my respect for the great films, like Kundun, and then I'll REALLY be unable to do my job.
I'll be stuck doing nothing, and be bereft of my moviewatching experience. I suppose it's taught me something, this movie about a religion I hardly know outside of the cinema: not only is suffering a part of my life: as a critic, inflicting suffering is a part of my life too.
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