The Little Buddha is a spiritual film, about a group of Buddhist monks, led by Lama Norbu (Ruocheng Ying), who searches for the child in which his great Buddhist teacher Lama Dorje (Geshe Tsultim Gyeltsen) was reincarnated.
Lama Norbu and his fellow monks believe they have found a candidate to reincarnate Dorje in the person of a boy named Jesse Conrad (Alex Wiesendanger) in Seattle.
The story is much more complex, Lama Norbu refers in parallel to the story of Buddha's life, which is a second line of action in the film.
In this representation, a Hindu prince named Siddhartha (Keanu Reeves) begins a journey to gain greater awareness. As he progresses, he learns profound truths about the nature of life, consciousness, and reality.
Eventually, he fights Mara (a demon who represents the ego), who repeatedly tries to deflect and destroy Siddhartha. Through a concentration detached from the world and the ultimate realization of the illusory nature of his ego, Siddhartha achieves enlightenment.
Little Buddha was directed by Italian director Bernardo Bertolucci starring Bridget Fonda and Keanu Reeves.