Wow! Such a good movie.

Very well executed

Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

This impressive documentary narrates story of the difficult history of Tibet and the culture of people inhabiting it, specifically, people practicing specific Buddhist meditations - yogis. What is more surprising, that the film included the stories and interviews of real yogis who have been on the retreat for a very long time and devoted several decades to those practices. The realism with which this documentary was made strongly impressed me. Previously, the image of the ascetic people was so vague for me, I did not clearly understand what motivates them, which physical and emotional challenges they experience. More interestingly, the film even represented the habitual things of the retreat like, for example, I was wondering what and how much those yogis eat when being on the retreat, how literally retreat is conducted etc. and the documentary provided the answers for that. The main idea of the film was so fascinating for me. The idea of your enemy being your greatest teacher made me think about many things in my personal life. Looking how Tibetan people who themselves and whose families and friends were prosecuted by the Chinese government are not seeking for the revenge, but striving towards compassion for them was completely novel for me. Looking how people wanted to meditate even in prison, where usually meditation is the last thing you would think about. Those monks are not angry, not sad, not frustrated because of those horrible experience of Chinese invasion, they control their mind so strongly that they are patient and happy with the reality, as it exists now. The content and satisfaction does not come as a result of something, but everything begins with it. And this is the concept that would be helpful to understand as a lot of people now are being so materialistic and so dissatisfied with what they have. The powerful words of one monk says: "The untrained mind is like a raging elephant out of control". In general, this idea of controlling and training your mind was a very influential concept for me. And the way yogis do it is that they exhaust all the potentials of human body to solely concentrate on own mind. They proclaim those retreat practices to be the most efficient one, because otherwise, you may know the theory, but there is no point in it without undergoing the hardships of physical meditation. And it comes to the point when the one can become dead purely just by such practices. I was just astonished about how powerful the control over your mind and body should be that you could literally kill yourself being in a good health and using just your own mind. Overall, this documentary was so impressing for me and it made me think about my spiritual state, about my attitude to what is happening in life. Probably, it is the time to stop being so demanding and just face the reality, which you are given, and be thankful for that. I loved the way this film gathered different interviews, real yogis' practices, photos of real people and old scriptures. Hearing something that happens in real life, and seeing the real people that not only tell the stories of Buddha, but actually try to follow the Dharma in the specific way, is a way more helpful and interesting. The content is great and I would recommend it to everyone, who seeks some signs in their life to change yourself. I can feel that I have grown at least a little after watching it.

The fascinating documentary "Yogis of Tibet" that allows regular people to take a look inside of the monks' secret lives was directed by Jeffrey M. Pill in 2002. The movie is super informative, it provides plenty of geographical and historical facts, narrates core philosophical principles of Buddhism and, all the more so, in the film we are able to hear voices of monks (even the 14th Dalai Lama had been interviewed for the documentary) and observe demonstrations of some of the yogic practices, which are usually cannot be filmed because of the health risks if performed improperly. The movie starts with describing the geographical region of Tibet and in what conditions people lived on Earth's highest plateau. Living in weather conditions which were often disastrous people of Tibet had short life expectancy and felt very well impermanence of life and sufferings, that is probably the reason why teachings of the Dharma (main teachings of Buddhism) were able to match the spiritual needs of the people of Tibet and merge with their own religious beliefs. The movie describes development of Buddhism and Yogic practices in Tibet and especially focuses on the significance of the time period of Chinese invasion, when there happened a major genocide and those Tibetans who were able to survive either refuged to neighboring countries or were living in terrifying conditions and imprisoned. These events had considerably affected lives of Tibetan laypeople and monks, and consequently the fate of the Buddhism in Tibet. In the documentary several prominent Buddhists and monks were interviewed. The presence of the live voices of the interviewees and demonstrations of their spiritual practices in this documentary allows better comprehending the reality in which these people live, which is so much different from ours. In my opinion, this was the strongest part of the documentary which made it to be exceptional and added a lot of points to its credibility. This movie is very thought-provoking, after watching it I was thinking a lot about things that I have heard. I was amazed by the story of the Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso about experience of one of the monks in Chinese Gulag. The monk said to him that there was a danger for him in the imprisonment, anybody would think about health risks or a danger of being killed, but the monk was talking about the danger when he almost lost his compassion towards the Chinese. This story is short but it made me to think a lot about life and the duality of nature of the world, simultaneous existence of inner peace and outer war. Also, this little story depicts very well one of the core principles of Buddhists' philosophy: power of compassion and love. Another part that I want to highlight is a theme of happiness, one of the monks told a very interesting thought, that nature of human is fulfilled from the beginning and everyone should seek happiness inside themselves, rather than from outside (by which he meant material things). There is one more thing that I cannot leave unmarked is selection of images and background music which created proper atmosphere for watching the documentary. Overall, I would suggest watching this film to those who are keen to know basics of Buddhist philosophy, since some ideas can be caught from this movie. I would like to name some of them to help you decide if you would want to watch it: How human nature is understood in Buddhist tradition and why culture in which a person lives is important? What are the relationships between monks and laypeople? What is principle of cause and effect in Buddhism? What is the goal of Buddhists and how do they perceive life and death? Why some Buddhists do Yoga and meditate? (keep in mind that it is all about Buddhists traditions in Tibet).

The documentary film introduces harsh history of Tibet, its cultural traditions and drastically different world, world of yogis - Dhrama practitioners. «The Yogis Of Tibet» includes stories, teachings and narration of yogis' experience giving an interview for the first time. It includes a basic content of Buddhism, it's main purpose and practices. In addition, the film shows an importance of yogis in preserving the traditions of the Tibetians and the problem of their extinction. Finally, the film shares an interview of some foreigners who also probably follow the Buddhist teachings. History of invasion of China into Tibet made me think about the value of almost dying spiritual heritage of the Tibetian culture. It is amazing how belief became a signature of their culture. The land of snows conceals deep mystery about the yogis. These people impressed me with their physical ability: total control over their body can be seen from the part of the film where a yogi shows a regular training which is actually unusual for me. Such unique and may be paranormal abilities of controlling body through concentration of the mind are total masterpiece for me because such ability needs lots of practices and persistence. Some scenes of the film the yogis practice their skills make me jealous because I understand a hardship of the way they have gone through to reach such achievements. That is why there are may mysteries about the yogis. A life of yogi is a whole course of training on the body and mind: they work to discover the purest nature of consciousness. They strive for the excellence of the purity of their mind and to empty their mind from conceptual thoughts. Two yogis tells stories which amazed me and introduced me to completely different life and environment. It is interesting to watch the way of achievement of their wish, but their wish is to be happy: to conquer negative emotions and seize happiness. This goal of all followers of the Dharma makes me to analyse my goals too. This film helps to realize the main things or at least to get rid of unnecessary things in life. It helps to find a focus on reality: many commodities that we posses are actually cause an attachment to materialistic things which is personally bad for me. I was unfamiliar with life of the yogis before, but it is more clear about them and their retreatment from the movie now. Their perspectives towards the life significantly influenced me. The yogis' lives teach me to rethink and arrange values of my life. I suggest to watch the film to everyone who constantly seeks a purpose in these life and simply are not satisfied with the current state. I guess I will often think about this movie and try to generate only positive energy every time when I go off the road. I concluded for myself that materialistic things are not real source of happiness. It is your turn to make your own conclusions by watching the film.

Monks, high spirituality, yoga, and, of course, Buddhism are among the first things which come to mind when we think about Tibet. However, all this is shrouded in secrecy and very few know what exactly monks perform in their retreats and what their practice includes. The documentary "The Yogis of Tibet" (2002) by Jeffrey M. Pill sheds some light on these questions; however, it reveals secret techniques of yogis not for fulfilling our curiosity, but rather to preserve vanishing culture of Tibetan Buddhism. But before demonstrating these mysterious practices, the documentary gives us the background for the origin and the evolution of Buddhism of Tibet. The information about the geography and early inhabitants of Tibet allows us to understand why exactly Tibet became the place of rigorous development of Buddhism. Through the comparison of Tibetan Buddhism with the Hinduism, the documentary elaborates on the peculiarities of monks, introduces us yogis and their role in the Tibetan society. The documentary not only gives plain data about them but also provides us with the interviews of these monks which makes the process of data comprehension much more interesting and enjoybale. Moreover, it shows the things for which we really can say that it deserves the name of "rare" documentary: the scenes of yogis' prayer and training, secret Yoga practices. In short, it enables viewers to feel the atmosphere of the actual Tibet rather than the Tibet picture of which is based on stereotypes and legends. Also, making the audience acquainted with the Tibetan Buddhism isn't the only thing which this documentary successfully achieves; besides this, it also manages to make the viewers admire the special nature of Tibetan culture and emphasizes its uniqueness. It creates such effect by showing how Tibetans preserved throughout the time the benevolent and peaceful notions of their religion towards others despite all hardships and cruelty they faced during foreign invasions. Lots of shots of Chinese invasion on Tibet, their cruel treatment of Tibetan monks serves as a proof for this, appealing to the audience's emotions, and, simultaneously, plays a role of evidence for the validity of facts presented in the film. We also learn a great deal about the Tibetan leaders, their contribution to the nation, which helps better understand the role of politics in the preservation of the culture. To the end, the focus of documentary shifts on the current situation of Tibetan culture; scenes of Buddhist monasteries in different countries, the interviews of western Buddhists serve as a proof of popularity of Tibetan Buddhism outside its home land. At the end, the documentary makes viewers wonder about the perspective of development of Tibetan Buddhism in Western civilization, and the future of Tibetan culture. To conclude, the documentary "Yogis of Tibet" gave me a more deep understanding of Tibetan Buddhism: its historical trends, secret practices, interviews of actual monks and Dalai Lama - all this makes a viewer not only better informed but also feel closer to their culture. In addition, it makes the audience curios about the future of this vanishing culture and its perspective of preservation in other civilizations. Thus, I highly recommend this documentary for the familiarization with Tibetan Buddhism, as it tells us from its early development to the nowadays position of this religion in a society.