Week 2 of the Tricycle BuddhaFest Online Film Festival starts today with Colors of Compassion, a “cinematic retreat” that documents the first retreat for people of color given by Vietnamese Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh. While the retreat was for people of color, many of the issues shared are universal. Thich Nhat Hanh tells us that by realizing the truth of “interbeing” we can arrive at our “true home.”

The film was shot at Deer Park Monastery over a period of four days in 2004. To watch an interview with the director of Colors of Compassion, Eloise de Leon, click here.

Also, if you haven’t yet, there’s still time to watch every movie. Once posted, all films will continue to be available until Monday, July 4. You haven’t missed a thing. To be part of this first-ever, global online Buddhist event, you must be a Tricycle Community Member and purchase an Online Festival Pass.

Last week we watched Fire Under the Snow, a documentary about the courageous life of the Tibetan monk Palden Gyatso, and With One Voice, a documentary about the mystic strands of the world’s religions.

One thoughtful reviewer had this to say about With One Voice:

It was very interesting to hear from seekers from a variety of traditions—some people that I heard of and others who are new to me. It was a difficult topic to talk about clearly and they all did so with grace and humility.

The film did seem to put forward an assumption of there being a “something” that is called by different names in different religions but is really the same. I think that idea may be an oversimplification—or a verbalizing of the wish/hope for unity among human beings. Just by listening to each of the people in the film I could see places where there was not complete harmony between them around what this “something” might consist of. One example is that some disciplines depend on the idea of a deity while others do not. Each seeker in the film has chosen a form to guide their seeking and perhaps, like scientists in the quantum age, the form of our seeking affects what we perceive.

What’s your take? Watch the film and tell us what you think!

Trailer: