Before getting into it, I'd like to say that I understand why people feel the need of giving a high rate to a movie that exposes real life injustices, I can understand that it almost feels necessary to defend such movies. But I don't do anything just because it is "politically correct". If someone makes an awful movie about children being killed in Palestine, well, yes, it is an awful thing that happens everyday and it is a topic that must be addressed in films so the public knows what is going on... but that doesn't make the movie any less awful.

Now, about the Nightingale of Tibet.

Why 2 stars? I don't even know where to start...

There is no script behind it, most of the movie we see people walking through the streets while we listen to a song. Sometimes that first song ends and a second one plays while the person keeps walking. There are maybe 6 scenes in the whole movie, the rest of the time it feels like I'm watching one of those Lonely Planet Travel Documentary from the old days, you know, music, sparse dialog, random shots of food, bicycles, cars and dogs in some remote place in Asia.

Some other times the draggy voice-over is telling us what is happening (supposedly),but the images don't show it (there is a clear example at the scene where the protagonist is escaping from jail: the voice over tells us "and she walked; she walked even further for days on end leaving it all behind", but the protagonist is STILL in prison, looking around and trying to find an exit. So even that is wrong.

Some other times, that voice-over explains what is going on in the character's heads, but we don't really see anything related to that. The actors are probably walking around the city.

Dialogs are missing 90% (the voice over tells us what they talked about) of the time, and absolutely ridiculous the remaining 10%. Edit is just awful, with zero attention to detail and without rhythm. Music choice is constantly bad, with no real attention to whether the song matched with the (intended) emotion on the screen (if any); if they wanted to just play a bunch of songs by Yoga Gyalnang, they should have made an album.

So... if the movie is so bad, Why 2 stars?

One because the story could be interesting (even though stories like this have been told over and over again).

The other one because I believe this movie could be used as a blueprint of 'How not to shoot/edit/direct a film. And that adds certain value to it.

This movie tells a layered story. It's about Drapchi, a prison in Lhasa (Tibet) that symbolizes control and fear. It's about the survival of Tibetan culture and Tibetan opera. It's about personal struggle in different forms. Tibetan opera combined with a touch of western rock music guides you through the amazing landscapes of Tibet while the opera singer Yiga crosses the mountains. Yiga wants to sing, she doesn't want to undergo the cultural make over forced on her and the other people of Tibet.

This movie was directed by Arvind Iyer with great respect for the Tibetan culture and music. This movie doesn't just tell us about an opera singer fighting for her music, it shows us the Tibetan way of looking at life, suffering, freedom and compassion. Interesting for people that are more or less informed about Tibet.