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Denise: Circle of Blessing

Denise: Circle of Blessing is a 60 minute documentary about the last three months of Denise Thornton's life. At age 49, Denise was diagnosed with stage-four, metastasized cancer. During the remaining three years of her life, Denise not only defied her initial prognosis of six months to live, but embraced her illness as a spiritual path and as a way of sharing her life with others. A brave and charismatic woman, Denise was a unique individual with much to teach us about our own lives.

Purchase Denise: Circle of Blessings $23, includes shipping.

 

 

Purchase Cambodia: Lord Mukpo's Dream Time $23, includes shipping.

Praise for Cambodia: Lord Mukpo's Dream Time

The constant noise in this city, including whatever music may be blaring out, generally just pisses me off. However, the traditional music on your picture had me in tears. Sublime. This is an emotionally charged country, no doubt about it. And you have reinforced why I am here... I'd like my father to see the video. He will relate to it (the usual protective shutters will prove useless). - Tony Maich, Phnom Penh, Cambodia

I wanted to tell you how LUMINOUS, STILL,VIVID and AMAZING your film was. DVDCover1Amazing in that I kept asking: were the colors really like that in Cambodia? Have I forgotten? HIS dream, yes. - Bayard Cobb, Boulder, USA.

I received your DVD yesterday and watched it as soon as I got home. I tell you, it is a real "Bill's style of film" - very plain, non-trying and beautifully told. It reminded me one of A. Einstein's quote: "Make everything as simple as possible, but not a bit simpler". You knew that borderline. - Erkan Aktas, Istanbul, Turkey

As I watched the images of Cambodia they mingled with memories of Ecuador and I felt like I was there behind the camera, seeing with your eyes. It's a beautiful, arresting film. The people were so genuine, so unaffected by the presence of the camera. And the water buffalo made my spine tingle. A film made by Life itself. - Lisa Thompson, Washington D.C., USA

 

The making of Cambodia: Lord Mukpo's Dream Time.

This was my first film, a thirty-minute documentary based on footage I took in Cambodia between February and June, 2007. On my daily, late afternoon walks I would sometimes bring my video camera (a tool I’d never really used before). I’d walk amidst the density of “suchness” – dense with noise, human population and something more. Not just interesting because it was foreign or I was a foreigner, but potent, as if less of some life-force has been drained from it, as if Phnom Penh was a mountain before strip mining ravaged it… or a city before freeways had been put up (which it is).

As soon as something stopped me, I knew it. A kind of double-take. Sometimes a street-vendor boiling eggs, sometimes a seamstress working. The double take told me I had to stop, even if I didn't’t want to. “Hello,” I would say, explaining in my mangled Khmer that I was making a documentary about life in Cambodia and may I film you? I was never refused, always received with humor or mild disbelief or astonishment.

One day, a “message” came – a kind of thought - that said: the footage must become a film and that its title must be Cambodia: Lord Mukpo’s Dream Time. Suddenly my imagination was galvanized, activated, seized or even ransacked by some energy - manic, as if I was receiving cosmic-espresso intravenously. And so on. Many hours of editing and melt-downs later I had what had become this film, something I never imagined or planned or thought of in the first place. Bill Scheffel

View this film on You Tube

related projects

Lord Mukpo Legacy & Studies: The teachings and legacy of Chögyam Trungpa.

Western Mountain Cinema: Documentary films by Bill Scheffel.

I Ching Sudies & Consultaions: Classes and individual consultations offered by Bill Scheffel.

Ibn Arabi Studies: Intersections between the great 13th Century Sufi saint & the drala principle.

Travel Writing: Travel without guidebooks & the origin of the Western Mountain.

Cambodia: Writings, reflections, visions.


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