Seven Years in Tibet

Directed by Jean-Jacques Annaud

In Seven Years in Tibet Brad Pitt stars as Heinrich Harrer, a cocky and egocentric Austrian
mountaineer whose thirst for fame leads him to lift his pregnant wife in order to join a 1939 expedition
to climb Nanga Parbat, one of the highest peaks of the Himalayas. His dreams of glory are shattered
when the team fails in its mission. Meanwhile, World War II has broken out in Europe and Harrer, an
enemy in a British colony, imprisoned in a POW camp in India. He escaped and climbed with David
Thewlis as Peter Aufschnaiter found sanctuary in Tibet. They struggle to life in the holy city of Lhasa
then met and married Pema (Lhakpa Tsamchoe), a beautiful Tibetan tailor.
Heinrich missed his wife and the son he has never seen. He teach the 14-year-old boy in
Western ways an learns much from the holy one about compassion, humility, and slowing down.
Heinrich's seven-year idyll was abruptly ended when the Chinese invade Tibet in 1950 and force the
Tibetans to sign an agreement surrendering their sovereignty. He feels the deep pain of the Dalai Lama
as these peaceful people who reject violence on principle are killed and their monasteries and cities
are destroyed. Director Jean-Jacques Annaud subtly conveys Heinrich Harrer's spiritual transformation.
By the time the ambi mountain climber returns home, he is a gentler and more sensitive man,
tempered by his contact with Tibetan Buddhism.