Metrograph

Endorsed by no less a personage than Christopher Moltisanti and condemned by the CCP, Scorsese’s epic biopic covers some two decades in the life of Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, from his selection to his arrival at Lhasa’s Potala Palace to his escape from the invading Chinese communists over the Indian border. Sumptuously lensed by the storied Roger Deakins, who counts the film among his personal favorites, with Philip Glass’s original score striking the perfect note of processional grandeur, Kundun is a ravishing immersion in an ancient—and imperiled—world of solemn rite and ritual, an outlier in its director’s filmography that demands rediscovery.

Distributor: Walt Disney Pictures / 20th Century Fox