Francisco Varela

Documentary account of a man’s life in the face of imminent death – Francisco Varela's story told affectionately and gently, touchingly and astutely. Varela spent his life building bridges: between Western science and Eastern wisdom, neurobiology and philosophy, abstract theory and practical life. This film seeks to deconstructs the prevailing division between science and art.

The systematic exploration of consciousness has a longstanding tradition stretching over hundreds of years in Tibetan philosophy. Since 1987 dialogues between Francisco Varela, other Western scientists and the Dalai Lama have been conducted regularly; with topics like healing and destructive emotions, the state of consciousness during sleeping, dreaming and dying etc.. These dialogues open up new paths of knowledge building bridges between Western scientific and Tibetan buddhist thinking, which are highly relevant and meaningful for today and for the future.

AUTOBIOGRAPHY: The personal history of Francisco Varela as told by him on his veranda in Monte Grande, Chile, on February 17, 2001 when he was already greatly weakened by chemotherapy but still extremely present and awake, three months before he died on May 28, 2001. As very few before him have done, Francisco Varela attained levels of accomplishment in Western science as well as in Buddhist philosophy and meditation. ORAL ANTHOLOGY: Individual interviews with Francisco Varela, Amy Cohen Varela, Bruno Latour, H.H. Dalai Lama, Tsoknyi Rinpoche; and poems by Francisco Varela, read by his father, Raúl Varela Rodríguez.

In "The Dalai Lama -- Scientist", the Dalai Lama tells the unknown story, in his own words, of his lifelong journey into the world of science and technology, and how the world has changed as a result. With extensive, rare, and never before seen footage, this film tells the very human story of the Dalai Lama that no one knows.