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Crazy Wisdom: A review by Victress Hitchcock
When I heard that Johanna Demetrakas was the filmmaker who was tackling the first feature documentary about Chogyam Trungpa, Rinpoche, I thought "Wow, now that's a monumental task . That takes some guts."
I could hear Rinpoche's voice echoing in my head.. "Good luck, Madam".
What a great gift we have all been given with the release of CRAZY WISDOM: The Life and Times of Chogyam Trungpa to be able to see how it all unfolded, to relive the magnetism, the terror, the humor, the confusion, the "I have no idea who this person is, or what I am really doing here, but there is no where else I want to be" experience of being a student of Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche in this lifetime.
There is no way I can make a truly unbiased critique of CRAZY WISDOM. I was there; I lived and breathed those times. But I do know that if the film were not the genuine article, I would know it right away. The film relies on our innate intelligence, it doesn't try to explain who Chogyam Trungpa was, it doesn't try to analyze what he accomplished, it doesn't try to justify the complexities of his life, it just throws the paint on the canvas and says "Here, how about this?" It allows him to gradually appear on the screen, brushstroke by brushstroke. And it creates for the viewers a vivid experience of what it was to be in his world.
With Trungpa Rinpoche, I always felt the sum was infinitely greater than the parts and I feel the same way about the film. If I were to dissect the structure, the flow, the themes, the stories that the filmmakers included in the film, I could get caught in an endless loop of analytical second guessing, which would block my ability to truly experience the film. Instead, I chose to sit back and relax and allow myself to settle in for the ride. I found it to be an extraordinarily rich movie journey conceptually and in its imagery and soundtrack.
This intricately woven tapestry of sound and visuals is why the movie works so well in a theatrical setting. It comes alive in the darkened theater. It becomes a shared lived experience, much as it was for those of us fortunate enough to be in the "scene" together in those whirlwind years.
The film has played to sold out houses at festivals in Santa Barbara, Boulder, Halifax, Vancouver, Washington, DC and Maui. It played to full houses night after night at the Rubin Museum in NY, and has opened in Los Angeles. Audiences of Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike are fascinated and moved by the story of Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche and the profound effect he had on bringing Dharma to the West.
The movie really comes alive when Trungpa Rinpoche is on the screen. There are some wonderful stories (my favorite was Jack Niland's account of how they found the perfect turquoise for the door at Tail of the Tiger), but when Rinpoche is on the screen it vibrates. What we see of him is tantalizing. I wanted more hang out time with him, maybe a little less structure, less form, more space--something more like the experience of being with him in the early days before scheduling and protocol and formal dinners. Someone in the film says it was in those unstructured moments that he learned the most. That's true for the film as well. It is in those moments where we see him in stills or film clips riding his white stallion, flower arranging, teaching in the early days of Naropa, smoking a cigarette bare-chested in someone's kitchen, where the quality of unadorned, naked reality is really present. It is in those moments you can see what others in the film talk about: how he was truly who he was, and truly kind.
The commentaries and the personal stories of being with him frame those moments well. I would have been happy with fewer other voices, yet I never felt they pulled me away from my own experience. I can imagine that for those without a personal experience of being with Rinpoche as a reference, the commentary from others is essential.
The film has finally given those who only know him through his books and his reputation, an opportunity to meet him. These days, everywhere I go in the Dharma world in the West, people are talking about Trungpa Rinpoche. Other teachers of the generation following him, quote him, and ask for us old students to tell stories of him. Many of them are increasingly acknowledging how essential his contributions to planting the seed of Dharma in the West were, how without Chogyam Trungpa's tireless efforts to decipher the western mind, their work would have been infinitely harder, or even impossible. Young students, too young to have ever met him, talk about him with awe. In my exchanges with young western practitioners, I am amazed at how many cite Trungpa Rinpohce's books, particularly Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism as their initial inspiration to practice Buddhadharma. Back when we started there were only a handful of books to choose from; now there are thousands, and Cutting Through is still the one that speaks most clearly to many young spiritual seekers.
Thank goodness the producers of CRAZY WISDOM were able to find so many beautiful images and clips to tell their story. Those were the days before the IPhone. Every waking moment was not being captured, which makes the moments we do see and the moments the students remember, more poignant and potent. CTR was a pre-technology guru; he spanned the gap between the cave and the computer. Accomplished without internet, without Facebook, without Twitter, his Dharma activity in his few years on this earth was mindboggling. It would seem impossible to contain such a vast array in a 90 minute film, but by staying true to her own vision and her heart connection to her teacher, Johanna Demetrakas has given us a rare glimpse of an authentic master.
For those of us lucky enough to have met him, the film is an evocative reminder of what we were given, and for audiences seeking a genuine connection with a spiritual path, CRAZY WISDOM: The Life and Times of Chogyam Trungpa, is a welcome breath of fresh air.
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