Hema Hema

Once every twelve years a ritual is held deep in the forest. Those who take part wear masks. Nobody knows who anybody else is. The gathering stays there for fifteen days. An elder oversees the whole arrangement. The purpose is to come to know oneself completely. The mask, though, also grants licence. Being hidden carries some of them somewhere else. Theft, violation and murder happen in this forest as well. The film sets the two possibilities side by side. The director Khyentse Norbu is a Bhutanese lama. He built the story on the state between death and rebirth. The masked encampment stands in for that passage. The image stays inside the forest from beginning to end. The production could not be screened in Bhutan. Tshering Dorji and Sadon Lhamo appear in the ninety five minute film, a Bhutanese and Hong Kong co-production Khyentse Norbu finished in 2016.