Milarepa first look shows Harvey Keitel as a guru

Harvey Keitel plays guru Marpa in the Buddhism-inspired science-fiction drama Milarepa from Italian filmmaker Louis Nero, according to a Variety report. Titled Milarepa, the English film is set in the near future where technology does not exist. It also stars F Murray Abraham, Franco Nero, Angela Molina, Iazua Larios, and Hal Yamanouchi. The Sardinia island served as the location for its principal photography, which leveraged its megalithic stone structures, craggy landscapes, and dunes.

Nero is also producing the film through his company L’Altrofilm, in association with ORWO Studios and Jake Seal of Black Hunger Studio. The plot of Milarepa is based on the eponymous Buddhist saint from the eleventh century. It follows a teenage Milarepa as she turns herself into a boy to learn a form of magical art to avenge those who did harm to her family. Keitel has combinations with the yet-to-be-announced actor for the titular character in the film.

Speaking about its genre, director Nero said that it is a sci-fi reimagining where “after the failure of technology, the human being returns to be at the center of the story, symbolically opposing the ephemerality of material things.”