MRAC Cinema Club presents The Monk and the Gun

Followed by refreshments Film release date: 2024 Film language: Dzongkha / English

Auditorium, Brolga Theatre

This Bhutanese comedy/drama, written, directed and co-produced by Pawo Choyning Dorji (Lunana) is an international co-production that premiered at the 50th Telluride Film Festival in 2023 and was Bhutan’s entry for Best International Foreign Film at the 96th Academy Awards. Set in the early 2000s at a time of enormous political and social change as Bhutan transitions to democracy, it tells the story of a young monk tasked to source 2 guns by his elderly mentor. This search coincides with the arrival of an American seeking to buy an antique rifle. Western and Asian values collide in a film that comments on the importance of peace and the value of community, contrasted with the American gun culture and Western values in general. Critics were favourable, awarding it between 3.5 and 4.5 stars.