Two Tibetan films have been selected at the North America’s Top South Asian film festival. “My Son Tenzin” and “Silent Dusk” were slated to be screened at Tasveer Film Festival, North America’s largest South Asian Film Festival and both of them are made Tibetan directors.
While “My Son Tenzin” is directed by Tsultrim Dorjee and Tashi Wangchuk who lives in the US, “Silent Dusk” is directed by Dandrin Dorje, a Tibetan independent filmmaker living in the Hainan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Qinghai Province, Tibet.
Tsultrim and Tashi earlier made Tibetan films such as “Richard Gere Is My Hero” and “Democracy In Exile” while Dandrin made “Butter Lamp” and “My Startup.” “My Son Tenzin” is a story about a Tibetan monk from Tibet who arrives in Oakland in California on an unlikely mission: to meet his son after more than twenty years of separation. The son, Tenzin, however, is untraceable.
Alone and helpless, a stranger in a strange land, the monk, Rabga, finds rescue in another Tenzin, a Tibetan taxi driver, who offers help in locating his son. The two embark on a journey–chasing clues, connecting dots, putting together pieces–and, along the way, discover things about themselves and each other that put in sharp relief the inescapable realities of their common fate: as a people of imperiled identity and vanishing culture.
“Silent Dusk” is about Grandpa Dorje who lives in a care home, a quiet man with no family. Grandma Lhamo’s arrival at the home brings a ray of light, but Grandma Lhamo is inconsolably sad. She remains silent until the day that Grandpa Dorje picks up his brush and begins to paint Gam Rinpoche, the Holy Mountain. Awakened by curiosity, Lhamo begins to open up to those around her. Tending to her every day, Grandpa Dorje tells Lhamo stories and takes her on adventures. With the shadow of illness just around the corner, the pair share joy and faith as they pass the days of their twilight years against the stunning landscape of the Tibetan plateau.
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