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Little BuddhaRating:
Release Date: 03 June, 2003 Retail Price: $9.99 OUR Price: $9.99 You SAVE: $0.00! Cast: |
Little Buddha Reviews
Feeling and learning the Impermanence
This movie moves my heart in many ways. My dad died the same year this movie was released, so the message hitted me in my soul. Impermanence of things and the world we live in. A Mother's and Father's love. The story of Siddharta that created the whole Buddhism religion. Adults and children can relate to the search for something more. We all fear death. This movie makes us wonder why. But the way Bertolucci creates the moods and the looks of stories that are separated by time and space is the most beautiful thing of all. The last frame after the credits made me shudder. We are only dust. That powerful image had stayed with me for years. This is your only chance to make things right and to live.I recommend this movie to all of us who had lost someone we deeply loved.
Confusion
Lemme confess right up front. I stopped watching after 90 minutes, and it only went on that long because I was too exhausted to find the remote.
Bernardo Bertolucci won an Oscar for directing THE LAST EMPEROR, and I don't know anyone who'd deny he deserved it. I won't. That was a fine film in many ways. But let me focus on just two ways. They're minor, but bear with me. Set design and educational value.
Now let us move on to LITTLE BUDDHA. When a Tibetan lama dies, they search for the person into which he was reincarnated and give him the lama job. Okay. I've got nothing against the Buddhists, so let's pretend they're right.
We have a little boy in Seattle who is the reincarnation of Lama Dodje. Well, I saw two other candidates, but there's no suspense in this. The cover has that little blonde boy amongst a bunch of shaved-head monk boys, all in robes. Plus, he gets way too much airtime. I stopped at 90 minutes, but I know he's the guy. There is no suspense.
The parents in Seattle. If I didn't have the dialogue to guide me, I'd never know what emotions they're showing us. They cannot act. But to be fair, in this film, who could? They're an engine to drive the plot, and if there were any way the author could've made the boy an orphan who just appeared in Bhutan one day with no life prior to that, he would've done it. They're that irrelevant.
The story, such as it is, alternates. The boy is obsessed with reading the book these monks gave him. About Siddharta, who we assume he's gonna try to emulate. We see the story, we see his lame life, we see the story, we see his lame life, etc. Finally, at last, eventually, after much stalling, he's in Bhutan. Yay!
The sets were gorgeous. Same as THE LAST EMPEROR. And I assume the director/author (same guy) was trying to teach me something about Tibetan Buddhism which I already know. I studied world religions a long time ago. But, what is he trying to tell me? I don't know. He's barking with all he's got, but I don't know that Timmy fell in the well again. I came away from this knowing it's a "message movie" but with no idea what the message was.
So, we have a movie with no character development, no witty dialogue, no plot, no entertainment value. And I don't get its message, which I assume is its reason for existence. Thus, I can see no reason to watch it. Instead, dig up your battered old copy of THE LAST EMPEROR and watch it again. I wish I could find mine...
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