Movie1:
Type: Director: Year: Country: Length: |
Banned Expression
Documentary Sonam Wangdue 2013 VOT, India 40 min. |
A Tibetan documentary film titled ‘Banned Expression’ highlighting the state of freedom of speech in Tibet will be screening at Human Rights Human Wrongs Film Festival currently underway in Oslo, Norway.
‘Banned Expression’ is an awareness campaign focusing on the Right to Freedom of Opinion, Expression and Information in Tibet. The campaign was first launched on the Human Rights Day 2013 in India jointly by Voice of Tibet and Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy. At the premiere scheduled on February 6, Dechen Pemba, founder and editor of 'High Peaks Pure Earth' website and Oystein Alme of VOT will make presentations along with Tibetan musician and singer Loten Namling at the film festival. Over a hundred Tibetan writers, poets, artistes, intellectuals and cultural figures promoting national identity and culture have been arrested, tortured and imprisoned since the 2008 uprising in Tibet, say Tibetan exiles. A six-day film festival will screen around 30 documentary films, feature an art exhibition, school screenings, with the goal of increasing human rights awareness amongst teenagers, larger debates, concerts and performances. Last year, the festival screened award winning Tibetan documentaries "Leaving Fear Behind," "The Sun Behind the Cloud," and "Tibet in Song". The Human Rights Human Wrongs Film Festival is organised by The Human Rights House Oslo and Oslo Dokumentarkino (the Oslo Documentary Cinema). The first version of the festival was organised in December 2008 to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Human Rights Declaration and since 2010, the Festival has been an annual event. |
Movie2:
Type: Director: Year: Country: Length: |
Escape from Tibet
Fiction Maria Blumencron 2012 AustriaLength 97 min. |
On a mountaineering tour in the Himalaya, Johanna meets the eight-year-old Tempa in a Tibetan monastery, where she grants the request of an old abbot to bring the boy secretly to Lhasa. Upon arriving in the capital, Johanna realizes that Tempa and a group of other Tibetan children are to be brought without any equipment over a dangerous high-mountain pass to Nepal.
When the Chinese police get wind of the plan, Johanna is suddenly suspected of collaborating with the charismatic leader of the trek, Tashi. Torn between her sense of responsibility to help Tempa and a justified fear for her own life, Johanna decides to go with the group. Action-drama “Escape from Tibet” tells the gripping story of the clash between Buddhist culture and the Chinese military, in a country where over 100 000 Tibetans have fled since the Dalai Lama went into exile in India in 1959. A hair-raising chase movie before a breathtaking landscape. Based on a true story. Source: http://www.kickfilm.de/en/info.php?film=Escape_from_Tibet |
Movie3:
Type: Director: Year: Country: Length: |
Good bye Tibet
Documentary Maria Blumencron 2010 Austria 90 min. |
This is the story of a mountain pass at nearly 6,000 meters on the border between Tibet and Nepal. For thousands of Tibetan refugees it has been the gateway to freedom – for many others it has been a fatal gauntlet.
It is the life story of Kelsang Jigme, a legend among guides who help refugees escape over the pass. It is the story of six children sent by their parents into exile across the highest mountain range in the world, and of their parents who had to stay back in Tibet. It is a story of imprisonment and torture – and the allegory of a love that knows no borders. Finally, it is the story of a family of kindred spirits formed over the years by all of the protagonists: the children, their mothers, the guides and the filmmaker herself. Ten years of destiny reflect the dreams, strength and hope of a nation that has never before been so threatened by its own demise Source: http://www.kickfilm.de/en/info.php?film=Good_Bye_Tibet |
Movie4:
Type: Director: Year: Country: Length: |
Dreaming Lhasa
Fiction Ritu Sarin and Tenzing Sonam 2005 India/UK 87 min. |
Karma, a Tibetan filmmaker from New York, goes to Dharamsala, the Dalai Lama’s exile headquarters in northern India, to make a documentary about former political prisoners who have escaped from Tibet. She wants to reconnect with her roots but is also escaping a deteriorating relationship back home.
One of Karma’s interviewees is Dhondup, an enigmatic ex-monk who has just escaped from Tibet. He confides in her that his real reason for coming to India is to fulfill his dying mother’s last wish, to deliver a charm box to a long-missing resistance fighter. Karma finds herself unwittingly falling in love with Dhondup even as she is sucked into the passion of his quest, which becomes a journey into Tibet’s fractured past and a voyage of self-discovery.Source: http://www.dreaminglhasa.com/home.htm |
Movie5:
Type: Director: Year: Country: Length: |
The Dialogue
Documentary Wang Wo 2013 ChinaLength 35min. |
The Dialogue documents the attempt by a group of Chinese intellectuals to circumvent the restrictive measures in place in China that prevent Chinese citizens from having free contact with the Dalai Lama, Tibet’s exiled leader. Using internet technologies they take the first step in establishing such a dialogue.
This film delves into the hostile fissures that separate nationalities within the modern People’s Republic of China. Most poignantly it includes footage of Uyghur scholar and human rights advocate Ilham Tohti discussing that divide. Appointed a visiting scholar at Indiana University in 2013, Ilham was seized at the Bejing airport before departure and forbidden to leave China. He was subjected to periods of house arrest and harassment until his re-arrest on January 15, 2014. He is accused of separatism and support for terrorism. The charges and ensuing trial are meant to silence him, making his appearance in The Dialogue that much more significant and wrenching. |
Movie6:
Type: Director: Year: Country: Length: |
Living Fear Behind
Documentary Dhondup Wangchen 2008 Tibet 24min. |
Leaving Fear Behind (in Tibetan, Jigdrel) is a heroic film shot by Tibetans from inside Tibet, who longed to bring Tibetan voices to the Beijing Olympic Games. With the global spotlight on China as it rises to host the XXIX Olympics, Tibetans wish to tell the world of their plight and their heartfelt grievances against Chinese rule. The footage was smuggled out of Tibet under extraordinary circumstances. The filmmakers were detained soon after sending their tapes out, and remain in detention today.
In a remarkable coincidence, filming concluded in early March 2008 on the eve of the eruption of unprecedented mass Tibetan protests across the Tibetan plateau. Shot primarily in the eastern provinces of Tibet, the film provides a glimpse into the hearts and minds of the Tibetan people and their longstanding resentment of Chinese policies in Tibet. The filmmakers traversed thousands of miles, asking ordinary Tibetans what they really feel about the Dalai Lama, China, and the Olympic Games. Dhondup Wangchen is a Tibetan filmmaker and activist who has been detained by Chinese authorities since March 2008 on charges related to a 25-minute documentary titled “Leaving Fear Behind”. The film is based on 35 hours of footage and 108 interviews that Wangchen conducted over five months. The footage includes candid conversations conducted in the Amdo region (located principally in today’s Qinghai province) with Tibetans who expressed views on a range of issues, from the Dalai Lama and the 2008 Beijing Olympics to the human rights situation in Tibetan areas. Shortly after the film was distributed outside of China, Dhondup Wangchen and his assistant, Jigme Gyatso, a senior Tibetan monk, were arrested and Dhondup Wangchen & Jigme Gyatso just had been released on Mid May 2014.Source: http://www.leavingfearbehind.com/dhondup-wangchen/ |