The Search

Two villages in Tibet have competed in archery for a thousand years. This is the story of the competition between Dradong and Nyima who each represent their village. As the story opens, Nyima has won the annual competition and is in love with Dradong's younger sister which angers Dradong. This film depicts Tibetan tradition and encroachment of modern technology.

A young Tibetan monk goes back home for the New Year's celebrations. Fascinated by television, he wants to bring his family's television to the monastery to show it to his master.

Stoic truck driver Jinpa picks up a silver dagger wearing hitchhiker in the desolate Kekexili plateau. The stranger suddenly reveals he’s going to kill the man who murdered his father.

A story of an aged sheepherder, his gruff grown son (who’s having trouble conceiving a child with his wife) and the old man’s Tibetan mastiff hound – a highly prized breed, much sought after by urban Chinese – whose existence is imperiled from all sides.

Tharlo is an orphan. Now grown up, he makes a living as a sheep herder in the village. He has grown a ponytail, so people simply call him “Ponytail”, since nobody remembers his real name anyway. Tharlo has a remarkable memory. He remembers so many things, except his own name. He is now in his forties, and he has yet to have his first woman. Now Tharlo goes to town to take a photo for his identity card. He meets a girl in the barber’s shop who changes the course of his life. He embarks on the journey to find his true self. He sells all his sheep and those entrusted by other villagers to him for care, and decides to use the money to go out into the world with the girl, only to find himself being deceived and cheated by her. Ironically, in his journey of self-discovery, Tharlo has lost his sense of self. As he witnesses in the mirror his ponytail being cut off and leaving him bald, he can no longer see himself as a man with a history that he recognizes.

On the Tibetan grasslands, Darje and Drolkar live a serene and ordinary life with their three sons and the grandfather. A condom sparks a series of embarrassment and dilemma, breaking the harmony of the family. What matters more in the circle of life and death, soul or reality?

Like all of Pema’s films, "Grassland" is set in rural Tibet ; it is a timeless allegory of an old nomadic couple searching for a stolen yak.