Seven Years in Tibet
Seven Years in Tibet
Brad Pitt, David Thewlis. An Austrian man escapes from a POW camp and forms a lasting friendship with the young Dalai Lama in this incredible true story. 1997/color/136 min/PG-13/fullscreen.If it hadn’t been for Brad Pitt signing on to play the lead role of obsessive Austrian mountain climber Heinrich Harrer, there’s a good chance this lavish million film would not have been made. It was one of two films from 1997 (the other being Martin Scorsese’s exquisite Kundun) to view the turmoil between China and Tibet through the eyes of the young Dalai Lama. But with Pitt onboard, this adaptation of Harrer’s acclaimed book focuses more on Harrer, a Nazi party member whose life was changed by his experiences in Tibet with the Dalai Lama. Having
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A White Silk Scarf,
This is a story about a stubborn and arrogant man who needs to push his body to its absolute limits, but who dedicates very little of his energy to his soul or intellect. That’s the concept the unites this film and the book on which it was based. But ultimately films owe no debt to the books or the reality on which they are based (read the book “Monster” by the late screenwriter and author John Gregory Dunne if you need to get that straight).
Brad Pitt is not unwatchable as Heinrich Harrer, but you may cringe at his Austrian accent. Just remember that this film may not have been made at all without his interest and participation, and it wouldn’t have been permitted the sort of budget that gave us the amazing landscapes which dominate the movie.
I suppose once they had their big star, casting went for the very finest actors they could find regardless of their status: therefore, we have two beautifully resonant performances by David Thewlis as Pitt’s climbing companion and Lhapka Tsamchoe as the Love Interest.
This movie is about Heinrich Harrer, but there is some focus on his ties to the Dalai Lama. Very little screen time is spent in the camp for enemy aliens (those were YEARS of his life) or the difficult scrabble simply to exist once he escaped. The shots of the Dalai Lama’s early childhood are there not only to foreshadow the important role the Dalai Lama ultimately plays, but also to establish a link between the child who befriends Harrer and the son who Harrer does not know.
The authenticity and detail of Tibetan life, dress, buildings, and so forth is rare and overwhelming. Even if it was staged, it is a good record of a lost time.
Further praise to the screenwriter (Becky Johnston) who translated a good book into a good movie. The addition of a few good laugh lines and the general development of character were well done.
Heinrich Harrer is an interesting man and merits a movie about his life. Of course, the elements of living in Tibet and developing a friendship with the Dalai Lama are crucial to the interest. For my part I’ve watched the movie several times and I always get deliciously lost in the scenery.
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|New respect for Brad Pitt,
I watched this movie for the first time when it was released in the theaters — at that time I thought it was good, but not great. Since then, I’ve had a chance to attend an event in which the Dalai Lama spoke, and have come to see this movie in a new light. The story of the personal transformation of Harrar is uplifting and inspiring. I was moved by the tenderness between the young Dalai Lama and Heinreich Harrar. I used to be one of those that thought Brad Pitt was more suited to roles in “teen movies,” but seeing “Seven Years in Tibet” proved me wrong. He has a depth in his acting that I didn’t realize before. He portrayed Harrar with sophistication and complexity. He showed the arrogant, selfish side of his character with equal believability as his portrayal of the tenderness and grief Harrar must have felt in his growing love for his friends in Tibet.
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|Respectful, visually stunning tribute to Tibetan culture,
SEVEN YEARS IN TIBET
(USA – 1997)
Aspect ratio: 2.39:1 (Panavision)
Theatrical soundtracks: Dolby Digital / SDDS-8
The only thing more beautiful than Brad Pitt in Jean-Jacques Annaud’s low-key drama SEVEN YEARS IN TIBET is the astonishing location photography (Argentina, Canada, Austria and the Himalayas standing in for Tibet), rendered in glorious Panavision widescreen by cinematographer Robert Fraisse. Pitt, every inch the blond Aryan god, plays real life explorer Heinrich Harrer (on whose book this film is based), an arrogant Nazi bully who ran from his wife’s unhappy pregnancy to conquer the Himalayas toward the end of the 1930′s. Stranded there by the outbreak of World War II, Harrer found his way to the forbidden city of Lhasa, where his unexpected friendship with the teenage Dalai Lama (played with great warmth and sincerity by non-actor Jamyang Jamtsho Wangchuk) curbed his ruthless streak and provided him with a fresh outloook on life, until he was forced to flee the country following the Chinese invasion.
Suffering from unfair comparisons with Martin Scorsese’s KUNDUN (1997), which opened shortly afterward – both movies were denounced by mainland Chinese officials – Annaud’s film evokes the splendors of a remote mountain community founded exclusively on Buddhist principles (in an amusing sequence, Pitt is asked to build a movie theater without killing the hundreds of worms uncovered by his workers’ excavations). It may be a Hollywoodized vision, but it’s also respectful and, in places, deeply moving (“Do you think someday people will look at Tibet on a movie screen and wonder what happened to us?” the Dalai Lama asks Pitt in one of the movie’s most self-referential moments).
When Chinese troops invade the Tibetan stronghold towards the end of the film, they display all the arrogance and hostility which had typified Harrer’s behavior until he was transformed by the example of his gracious hosts. Distinguished by John Williams’ majestic score (so much better than the tuneless dirge he provided for SLEEPERS the previous year), the film also features David Thewlis (NAKED) as Pitt’s climbing partner, Lhakpa Tsamchoe as the beautiful woman who comes between them for a while, and B.D. Wong as a lowly Tibetan official whose vanity and cowardice prompts the downfall of his own culture.
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