Tulku (Masters who are Reborn in the West)

This is an unusual film about the difficulties faced by Tibetan masters who have chosen to reincarnate in the West.

The film was made by Gesar Mukpo, who is the son of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche and his British wife Diana, and who has been recognised as the reincarnation of Shechen Kongtrul Rinpoche.

He not only relates his own story, and discusses the problems he has faced, but also seeks out and discusses the situation of four other prominent western tulkus: Dylan Henderson, Ashoka Mukpo (his half-brother), Wyatt Arnold, and Reuben Adrian Derksen.

Each has not only been recognised as a prominent reincarnation of a great master, but has had to face the difficulties of growing up in the west, where the support system for tulkus is absent.

In the film Gesar interviews not only these western tulkus, but also his teacher Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche and the Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje, who both are tulkus themselves, and his mother who married his father when she was just 16.

All the western tulkus have faced problems trying to integrate their recognised status with their life in the west, a couple appear to be quite confused by the identity problems caused by it, and one of them has even rejected Buddhism.