Dhamma Brothers DVD & Book Set The Dhamma Brothers film, Letters from the Dhamma Brothers book

"…takes you on a thrilling and hopeful voyage through a very dark place." "The teachings of the Buddha infiltrate a maximum-security prison in "The Dhamma Brothers," a thinking-head documentary about finding answers within for those who can't get out. …"The Dhamma Brothers" offers a constructive alternative to the hopelessness of human warehousing." "The Dhamma Brothers" inverts what we typically think of as the depressing aspects of the prison experience—isolation and repetition—and recasts them by having them serve a higher, and ultimately liberating, purpose. For ten days, the students do not speak. For hours on end, they meditate in positions that come to take a physical toll. No telephones or televisions are available during the ten days, so that essentially a “prison within a prison” begins to take shape. Normally such circumstances would be considered punitive, but in this context the prisoners embrace them. Similarly, the film gently prods us to make a connection to the way we treat the circumstances of our own lives. And if one thinks about it, prisons have long been used as psychological and spiritual metaphors. That’s true for nineteenth century European novels, twentieth century American film noir, and the extraordinary films on the subject made by Jacques Becker and Robert Bresson (the latter would have liked the comparison to a “monastic setting” that this film makes).
So if you want high drama, the leisurely-paced but fascinating The Dhamma Brothers is not the place to turn. However, if you want a movie-delivered break from all the self-created drama that most of us live our lives in thrall of, there is no better place to start. "The Dhamma Brothers is a convincing documentary that proves the cathartic value of meditation in the lives of these prison inmates who share their experiences of inner peace and growing compassion." "A wonderful, powerful film. A rare inspiration to all of us."