Buddhism in cinema

Priyanka KURUGALA

We are a very fortunate community as Buddhists, especially in Sri Lanka. We are commemorating the 2599the anniversary of the Buddha's enlightenment. It will be more important next year, as it will be the 2600th Sri Sambuddha Anniversary. It is a blissful moment to commemorate the enlightenment of the Buddha.

We, as Sri Lankan Buddhists are obliged to commemorate this event by actually practicing the Dhamma. We should learn and then teach. Not only that, but we should also follow the Buddhist path.

As a nation we have a massive message to deliver to the world. Sri Lanka is little known in the world for its role of Buddhism, though it is more known for Cricket and the recently annihilated terrorism.

We should go forth with this blessed gift given by India. It will mean the calm of the world, consolation of the world.

In this background Light of Asia Foundation is getting ready to showcase a Buddhist film festival titled Cinema Dansela at the BMICH on May 28, 29 and 30. The Foundation expects to deliver the Dhamma to the world through cinema media. Two-hundred selected foreign films will be shown in this film festival. As a first step, they launched a film festival at the BMICH in 2009. They had 140 films from all around the Buddhist world. Chosen excellent films were awarded.

Suchcha Matha clinched the first place among the local films. The second place went for Aththammage Budalaya, and the third for 'Towards Enlightenment'. 'Oil Lamp for the Buddha', 'Sneekar Karmer' and 'Heart Suthra' were chosen as the best from the foreign films. "Our target is to see Sri Lanka as the Buddhist film centre in 2011". The organizers of the event told Daily News Vesak Supplement.

More Buddhist-themed films are expected to be shown in near future under five categories: feature, documentary, animation, short and mobile. The time allocation for each film will be one and half hours: 22 minutes for documentaries, 12 for animations, 10 for short and four mobile films. These films feature Jataka stories for children, while Kapilavatthu model could also be seen. Animated Pandals, Vesak e-cards, art, photography, e-paintings will also be showcased.

Along with the Sri Sambuddhathwa Jayanthi 2011, biography of Siddhartha Gautama Bodhisattva will make its way to cinema media too with the script written by Edwin Ariyadasa and Saman Weeraman.

Light of Asia Foundation works hand in hand with National Film Corporation, BMICH, and International Computer and Technology Agency (ICTA). Cinema artistes such as Richard Gere, Steven Segal, Harrison Ford, Jackie Chan, Kate Bosworth, Goldie Hawn, Orlando Bloom, Shahrukh Khan, Kareena Kapoor, Keanu Reeves, George Lucas, Tina Turner, Jennifer Lopez, Oliver Stone, Bernardo Bertulucci will be invited to grace the event.