But there are better ways for American audiences to discover Tibet and its leader in exile than through a movie that, although entertaining, cannot deliver on its isolated moments of insight. Even at a running time of over two hours, too many complex issues of nationality, tradition, and belief are raised by this story for one fictionalized depiction to explore. The result is a beautiful picture that shows flashes of brilliance but lacks overall depth.

It takes more than an hour of screen time to get Heinrich to Tibet. First he must coldly leave his pregnant wife at a Vienna train station and travel to the Himalayas, where a German team led by Peter Aufschnaiter (David Thewlis) assaults the lofty peak of Nanga Parbat for the glory of National Socialism. The failed attempt ends when the British government of India declares war on Germany, and the Axis-allied mountain climbers are placed in a P.O.W. camp. Escape throws colorless Peter and supercilious Heinrich together in a flight to Tibet and then (in disguise) into Llasa, where they live for several years under the protection of a court official before the teenage Dalai Lama summons Heinrich to his presence. The young ruler is eager to open his mind to the technology and learning of the outside world. But that same world, in the form of the Chinese army, is about to overwhelm his own.

Pitt's Austrian accent is almost a parody--he swallows every third word. When he's not speaking, however, his mannerisms reveal Heinrich's smug sense of superiority over his mountaineering teammates, the Tibetans, even the Indian laborer he impersonates during his escape attempt. He thinks that by mocking those he doesn't understand, he can dominate them. Flashing his charismatic smile, he reveals the inadequacy and danger of the Western, individualistic model of leadership: It treats followers as means to a leader's ends and respects only the strong. In contrast, the Dalai Lama has power because of his people's belief in him as a protector of all life, down to the lowly worms that are lovingly relocated when Heinrich builds a movie theater. When the Chinese appear, we have a brief glimpse of a third model: the leveling, intolerant, cocksure attitude of fanatics who are convinced they have the answer for the world. Caught between these forces, what chance do the Tibetans have?

The problem with telling this tale through Heinrich's European eyes is that the movie falls into the Occidental habit of stopping at the East's shimmering, alien surfaces. Although Harrar might have had a deeper understanding of Tibetan culture, it cannot be communicated to us in this brief entertainment, and so we root for the preservation of Tibet's color and spectacle simply because they are photogenic. Few of the beliefs or teachings of Tibetan Buddhism emerge from the clouds of mysticism and the inscrutable foreign protocol. It's hard to blame screenwriter Becky Johnston or director Jean-Jacques Annaud for lingering over these multicultural delicacies, because Western audiences have an insatiable appetite for images of the exotic and mysterious East.

Precious little history or religion puts the pretty pictures in context, however, leaving us with an impressively photographed travelogue--actually, it's not even that, considering that Argentina and Canada stand in for Tibet. In the final analysis, the differences in worldview between the Dalai Lama and ourselves are reduced to quotations from the Buddha. It seems to be enough for Heinrich and the filmmakers that the Tibetans are somehow different. And since the Europeans and the Communists have proven morally bankrupt, the mere fact of difference suffices as an antidote--it's easier to dramatize than the diverse ideas and values themselves.