Start the week with a film: Bhutan-set ‘The Monk and the Gun’ is a charming comedy about modernity

Given everything that is going on in the world (Israel’s carnage in Gaza, Russia’s never-ending invasion of Ukraine, America’s war on itself), the anti-violence message of The Monk and the Gun (2023) seems naive. But better that than cynical.

Bhutanese director Pawo Choyning Dorji’s film takes place against the backdrop of the Himalayan kingdom’s first democratic election. A mock election is taking place to train citizens in democracy. They are instructed to choose between three fictitious parties.

Blue symbolises freedom and equality. Red represents industrial development. Yellow preserves the status quo. Government officials earnestly get to work, but the people are sceptical. Look at our neighbour India – they are pulling each other’s beards and throwing chairs at each other, one man observes.

Meanwhile, an elderly monk asks his disciple to fetch him guns. The country is changing, the monk laments. The younger monk doesn’t know even what a gun looks like. But he is bound to serve his master, and so he sets out to look for the weapons. In the third strand, an American turns up in Bhutan to buy an antique rifle.

These intersecting stories provide a fascinating glimpse into a sheltered country’s tentative steps towards an imported value system. The film is a charmer, folding into...

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