The life of

Siddhartha Gautama Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha (),* * * was a śramaṇa, wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism. According to Buddhist lege ...

, the Buddha, has been the subject of several

films A film, also known as a movie or motion picture, is a work of Visual arts, visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, emotions, or atmosphere through the use of moving images that are gen ...

History

The first known film about the life of Buddha was ''Buddhadev'' (English title: ''Lord Buddha'') which was produced by the well-known Indian filmmaker

Dadasaheb Phalke Dhundiraj Govind Phalke (Pronunciation: Help:IPA/Marathi, ̪ʱuɳɖiɾaːd͡ʒ pʰaːɭke, popularly known as Dadasaheb Phalke (30 April 1870 – 16 February 1944), was an Indian producer-director-screenwriter, known as "the Father of Indian ...

(1870–1944) in 1923. Two years later, another important Buddha film was released, ''The Light of Asia'' (Hindi title: ''

Prem Sanyas ''Prem Sanyas'' (''The Light of Asia'') (''Die Leuchte Asiens'' in German) is a 1925 silent film, directed by Franz Osten and Himansu Rai. It was adapted from the book, ''The Light of Asia'' (1879) in Verse (poetry), verse, by Edwin Arnold, bas ...

''). This movie was made by the German filmmaker

Franz Osten Franz Osten (23 December 1876 in Munich – 2 December 1956) was a Bavaria, Bavarian filmmaker who along with Himansu Rai was among the first retainers of Bombay Talkies. Osten partnered with Rai on a number of India's earliest blockbuster film ...

(1875–1956).

Himansu Rai Himanshu Rai (1892 – 16 May 1940) was an Indian actor and film director. Regarded as one of the pioneers of Indian cinema, he is best known as the founder of the studio in 1934, along with Devika Rani. He was associated with a number of mov ...

(1892–1940) played the Buddha. Its title suggests that the script was based on the book ''

The Light of Asia ''The Light of Asia'', or ''The Great Renunciation'' (''Mahâbhinishkramana''), is a book by Sir Edwin Arnold. The first edition of the book was published in London in July 1879. In the form of a narrative poem, the book endeavours to descri ...

'' composed by the British poet

Sir Edwin Arnold Sir Edwin Arnold (10 June 1832 – 24 March 1904) was an English poet and journalist. He is best known for his 1879 work, ''The Light of Asia''. Born in Gravesend, Kent, Arnold's early education at King's School, Rochester, and later at King ...

, which was issued by the

Theosophical Society The Theosophical Society is the organizational body of Theosophy, an esoteric new religious movement. It was founded in New York City, U.S.A. in 1875. Among its founders were Helena Blavatsky, a Russian mystic and the principal thinker of the ...

in 1891. In fact, its contents deviate deliberately from Arnold's book. The film was a greater success in Europe than in India. It gives a somewhat romantic picture of the life of Buddha. ''Buddhadev'' as well as ''The Light of Asia'' were

silent film A silent film is a film without synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, w ...

s. On March 20, 1952, a Japanese feature film representing the life of Buddha had its premiere, ''

Dedication of the Great Buddha is a 1952 Japanese film directed by Teinosuke Kinugasa. It was entered into the 1953 Cannes Film Festival. Cast * Shinobu Araki as Ryōben * Kōtarō Bandō * Kazuo Hasegawa as Kunihito Tateto * Sumiko Hidaka as Morime Ōmiya * Tatsuya Ishigu ...

''. Director

Teinosuke Kinugasa was a Japanese filmmaker and actor. His best-known films include the Silent film, silent Experimental film, avant-garde films ''A Page of Madness'' and ''Crossroads (1928 film), Crossroads'' and the Academy Awards, Academy Award-winning historic ...

(1896–1982) directed the picture under the Japanese film company Daiei Eiga. It was nominated for the

1953 Cannes Film Festival The 6th Cannes Film Festival took place from 15 to 29 April 1953. French writer and filmmaker Jean Cocteau served as jury president for the main competition. The Grand Prize of the Festival was awarded, as the highest prize, to '' The Wages of F ...

. Another film about Buddha was a

documentary film A documentary film (often described simply as a documentary) is a nonfiction Film, motion picture intended to "document reality, primarily for instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". The American author and ...

entitled ''Gotama the Buddha''. It was released by the government of India in 1957 as part of the Buddha's 2500th birthday celebration. Rajbans Khanna acted as director and Bimal Roy as producer. It got an honorable mention at the Cannes film festival in 1957. It is a black-and-white film consisting of beautiful images of natural environments,

archeological sites Archaeology or archeology is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscapes. Archaeology ...

, reliefs and paintings, ancient ones from Ajanta as well as modern ones accompanied by a

voice over Voice-over (also known as off-camera or off-stage commentary) is a production technique used in radio, television, filmmaking, theatre, and other media in which a descriptive or expository voice that is not part of the narrative (i.e., non-d ...

relating the history of Buddha. The film ''Angulimal'' (1960) was not directly based on the life of Buddha, but on the life of a dacoit and killer who used to loot and kill innocent people and cut off their fingers and who made a garland of such fingers to wear around his neck, thus he got the name Angulimal (Anguli: finger, mala: garland). The film depicts an incident where the dreaded dacoit once met the Buddha when Buddha was passing by a forest and goes ahead to kill him, but was corrected by the compassion of Buddha. The fifth film about Buddha was a Japanese one, ''Shaka'', produced by Kenji Misumi in 1961. It was shown in the US in 1963 under the title ''Buddha''. On February 13, 1964, a Korean film about the life of the Buddha had its premiere, ''Seokgamoni'', the Korean translation of the Sanskrit ''Shakyamuni'', which in

Mahayana Buddhism Mahāyāna ( ; , , ; ) is a term for a broad group of Buddhist traditions, texts, philosophies, and practices developed in ancient India ( onwards). It is considered one of the three main existing branches of Buddhism, the others being Thera ...

is the term for the historical Buddha. In 1997 the Indian producer G.A. Sheshagiri Rao made a Buddha film. It was simply entitled ''Buddha''. This one did not roll in cinemas, but it was only sold on DVD. This one is also the longest movie about Buddha, as it consists of five DVDs with approximately 180 minutes film each. In 2008, K. Raja Sekhar produced another Buddha film entitled '' Tathagata Buddha''. The original film was in Telugu, but later it was dubbed in Hindi. This film relates Buddha's life story until its end, his ''parinirvana''. The film is available on DVD. It is known that Buddhists in countries like Sri Lanka and Burma abhor the very idea of any human being impersonating the Buddha in a film. After its release in 1925 ''The Light of Asia'' was banned in Sri Lanka and the Malay States (contemporary West Malaysia).Rachel Dwyer, ''Filming the Gods: Religion and Indian Cinema'', London ''et al.'': Routledge, p. 28.

List of films on the life of Buddha

References

{{inc-film, date=October 2021

History

List of films on the life of Buddha

See also

References