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Tsoknyi Rinpoche and Richard Gere during the filming of When the Iron Bird Flies. Photo © When the Iron Bird Flies.

When the Iron Bird Flies, a new feature-length documentary about Tibetan Buddhism and the West, is having its premiere screening at the Rubin Museum of Art in New York City October 19-24. Dr. Nick Ribush, director of the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive, will be speaking at the Saturday, October 20 evening screening. The Archive contributed materials on FPMT founders Lama Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche to the film.

Victress Hitchcock, a long-time student of Tibetan Buddhism and an experienced filmmaker, directed When the Iron Bird Flies. Her earlier film Blessings: The Tsoknyi Nangchen Nuns of Tibet documents the lives of 3,000 nuns living across the remote mountains of Eastern Tibet. Hitchcock collaborated on the film with Tsoknyi Rinpoche. “In the spring of 2009,” Hitchcock recalls, “just after Blessings was released, Tsoknyi Rinpoche called me from India and said, ‘Let’s make another movie!’ This time, the idea was to look at how these same spiritual practices are penetrating Western culture as Tibetan Buddhism becomes more and more accessible in the West.”

When the Iron Bird Flies features interviews with Tibetan lamas and practitioners as well as Western students, teachers and scholars, including His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche, Jetsün Khandro Rinpoche, Geshe Kelsang Wangmo, B. Alan Wallace, E. Gene Smith, Richard Davidson and many others. You can watch a trailer for the movie online.

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