Seven years in the making, When the Dragon Swallowed the Sun is the first inside look at the Tibetan movement to free Tibet from Chinese occupation, its internal conflicts and contradictions. The combination of footage from India, China, Tibet and the US along with a prologue narrated by Dennis Haysbert and an original soundtrack by Philip Glass, Thom Yorke and Damien Rice make this the first film that presents the complexity of the struggle with such emotional impact. The film features Richard Gere, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, The Dalai Lama, the newly crowned 18th descendant of the Great Religious Kings of Tibet, some of the most prominent Chinese contemporary artists, and all the key figures of the exiled Tibetan freedom movement and their followers.