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The first thing to strike you, like an ancient temple bell, upon encountering cinema from Bhutan is this most intimate recognition: why are these luminous films from the high Himalayas more revelatory of the Thai cosmic mind, our view and sense of nature and elemental forces, of social propriety and social hypocrisy, of life and death, than most of Thai cinema, horror, arthouse or otherwise? They are not pale imitations of Hollywood or European art films. They are most assuredly themselves; their immediacy of experience expressed with full cinematic power to blow away your mind.

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Bhutan

119 mins

Dzongkha & English / with English subtitles

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‘Pig at the Crossing’ is quite simply one of the most potent films ever made. A cinematic Death Meditation by a monk director may not sound like your idea of entertainment, but it grabs you by the roots of your heart from the ‘we are just pig meat’ scene, and tosses you out of your carcass to wander frantically among literal lost souls until unfinished business is done and you can move on. Some horror movies aim to make you scream but this is horror to make you shiver—a piercing immersion in what both the Bible and the I Ching call “fear and trembling”. Director Khyentse Norbu (Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche) of The Cup fame is festooned with international awards and this movie is awesome but, oddly, it never went to the big festivals. Here’s the proof, if you still needed any, that the film festival circuit is broken.

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(Alice Skinhead)

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Trailer : https://youtu.be/WM4fxk88V2Y

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Bhutan

135 mins

English subtitles

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Remote, superstitious (and resource-rich) village. Night. XCU grass blades being trampled by police boots on a literal witch-hunt. The cliff is blood-stained, the abbess of a Buddhist monastery has gone missing and the village idiot has blamed “the Demoness Chedu”, described as “Beautiful. Scary. Flirtatious.” Oh-oh! Authorised female spirituality has been murdered by unsanctioned, ancient and forbidden female mysticism, much feared and suppressed by the religious patriarchy. Chedu’s young niece runs off to warn her aunt, who gives one last parting advice, woman to little girl: “Stand by what you believe to be true.”

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Fruitlessly Kinley the dashing cop tracks the fugitive, but it is the Dakini (Skydancer/Demoness/Goddess, possibly like the Thai ‘Chi Ploey’—“naked nuns/mystics” who “wear the wind and sky”) who finds and bewitches him. Similar resonance can be found between “honeygiver among the dogs” and the Thai saying “violinist among the buffaloes”, amidst tales of Dakini persecution through the ages. A haunting and pleasurable Bhutan murder mystery that’s beautiful, surprising and, yes, mystical.

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(Alice Skinhead)

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Trailer : https://youtu.be/Ck1g9OgZBz0?si=eTW2xeLcdtJKaK5S

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Ticket 160 Baht / Seat

[Tickets Available in front of the cinema]

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