Seven Years in Tibet

3.00
    Seven Years in Tibet
    1997

    Synopsis

    Austrian mountaineer, Heinrich Harrer journeys to the Himalayas without his family to head an expedition in 1939. But when World War II breaks out, the arrogant Harrer falls into Allied forces' hands as a prisoner of war. He escapes with a fellow detainee and makes his way to Llaso, Tibet, where he meets the 14-year-old Dalai Lama, whose friendship ultimately transforms his outlook on life.

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    Cast

    • Brad PittHeinrich Harrer
    • Jamyang Jamtsho WangchukDalai Lama, 14 Years Old
    • David ThewlisPeter Aufschnaiter
    • BD WongNgawang Jigme
    • MakoKungo Tsarong
    • Lhakpa TsamchoePema Lhaki
    • Ingeborga DapkūnaitėIngrid Harrer
    • Duncan FraserBritish Officer
    • Danny DenzongpaRegent
    • Victor WongChinese 'Amban'

    Recommendations

    • 78

      Austin Chronicle

      Annaud (The Lover, The Name of the Rose, Quest for Fire) may be, with all due respect to Stanley Kubrick, the most talented adapter of literary source material in recent film history. Seven Years confirms his mastery by doling out a perfect ratio of moving interpersonal drama and visual enchantment.
    • 75

      Christian Science Monitor

      The movie is a star vehicle at heart, aimed more at marketing Pitt's popularity than probing complexities of empire-building and cultural clash that trouble the Tibetan region to this day.
    • 70

      The New York Times

      Beyond his struggles with an unwieldy accent and the screenplay's hokum, Mr. Pitt gives a sincere if labored performance enhanced by a sense of genuine struggle.
    • 63

      Chicago Sun-Times

      Seven Years in Tibet is an ambitious and beautiful movie with much to interest the patient viewer, but it makes the common mistake of many films about travelers and explorers: It is more concerned with their adventures than with what they discover.
    • 63

      ReelViews

      Annaud's desire to create an epic tale actually harms the production, since it results in unnecessary scenes that pad the running length to more than two hours.
    • 63

      Rolling Stone

      Seven Years in Tibet, however flawed, has feeling and purpose. It bears witness.
    • 60

      Variety

      Despite some magnificent widescreen lensing, faultless ethnographic detail and a timely sympathy for the plight of the Tibetan people, director Jean-Jacques Annaud's true-life tale about a self-obsessed Austrian mountaineer who learns selflessness in the Himalayas too rarely delivers at a simple emotional level.
    • 60

      Salon

      The bad news is that Pitt, despite this film's high-minded intentions (there are Yo-Yo Ma cello solos on the soundtrack, and China expert Orville Schell acted as an advisor during the shoot), or more likely because of them, finds himself trapped in a long, earnest movie that fails to ever feel very alive.

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