Kundun

Kundun (1997) is a historical drama directed by Martin Scorsese that you can watch online on iFILM. The film follows the fourteenth Dalai Lama from his recognition as a two-year-old boy in a Tibetan village through his crossing into exile in 1959. Melissa Mathison wrote the screenplay, Roger Deakins shot it, and Philip Glass composed the score.

The child Tenzin Gyatso is barely old enough to walk when monks identify him as Kundun — "The Presence" — heir to centuries of spiritual authority. His education is vast and deliberate. Then the Chinese military arrives, and the slow machinery of occupation begins to grind. The young leader travels to Beijing, meets Mao, and returns knowing that negotiation has run out. Staying means captivity. Leaving means exile with no clear end.

Scorsese cast the film almost entirely with Tibetan refugees, many of whom lived through the events depicted. The production filmed in Morocco and India — Tibet was closed to the crew. When the film was released, Chinese authorities pressured Disney into a temporary ban on its pictures within China. Stream Kundun (1997) online on iFILM.