Snow lion and the glaciologist
2021 · 1m · Bhutan
Directed by Arun Bhattarai
Genres: biography, documentary, essay film
Tones: contemplative, melancholic, tender
One of Bhutan's first glaciologists hikes for days through dangerous Himalayan terrain each year to measure rapidly receding glaciers, torn between his scientific mission and the local belief that the mountains should not be climbed.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
A one-minute essay film about a glaciologist caught between science and faith sounds like it could be a listicle, but Bhattarai refuses the easy resolution—there's real tension here, not the false wisdom of 'both sides.' The fact that it ends unresolved, in genuine conflict, is genuinely subversive for a climate doc.
This is rigorous formal filmmaking: every frame weighted with the geography and theology of the Himalayas, the editing pacing the interior debate as precisely as the glaciers pace their retreat. The restraint—letting landscape and silence do the argumentative work—places it squarely in the lineage of Koreeda and Akerman's essayistic tradition.
The decision to let the scientist's footsteps and breathing anchor the entire piece instead of scores or explanatory narration—that single choice transforms what could be a worthy PBS segment into something physically present and morally claustrophobic. That's craft that earns its urgency.