Starring Shawn Ku and Christy Chung. In Tibetan and Ladakhi with English subtitles. Rated 18A.

Some years back, when the on-line humour magazine the Onion was always funny, it ran a photo of a smiling monk, putative winner of a yoga competition, alongside the caption "I am the serenest."

The struggle to cleanse spirituality of that kind of striving and make it central to everyday affairs is the main subject of Samsara, a profoundly moving and beautifully photographed film from Pan Nalin, the Indian-born director of Ayurveda: Art of Being.

The struggle, and the affairs, are mostly those of a young monk called Tashi, played by the infinitely subtle Shawn Ku. Not that he's the sort to simply stare at the unfolding cosmos. After meditating for three years in a Himalayan cave high in the Ladakh region of Northern India, the monastery-raised Tashi is taken to a nearby village, where he encounters womanhood for the first time. The fact that she's played by Montreal-born Asian superstar Christy Chung probably adds a bit more fizz to his reaction, but truth be told, this monk is ready to go off at the first opportunity--as his wizened old master (Sherab Sangey) immediately notices.

So far, the themes and even the events of the film resemble those of Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter...and Spring. But where the recent South Korean effort keeps things on a sparely metaphorical basis, Samsara (a Sanskrit word referring to reincarnation and cycles of life) gets down with the details. To win the woman's hand, Tashi must separate her from her fiancé, convince her father that he's good marriage material, and turn into an upstanding citizen. And if he achieves all that, will everyday life be enough? What about that kohl-eyed Indian girl (Neelesha BaVora) who stands out amongst the migrant workers gathering local crops?

Once his hair grows long like the locals', our ex-monk also finds himself in the thick of regional politics, encouraging farmers to sell their crops more profitably than they do through the local ruthless capitalist, who is none too pleased with such "modern" ways.

To the director's credit, these developments steer clear of the melodrama that would have obscured his film's intentions: to show how the challenge of the regular world, with its small conflicts and occasionally transcendent moments--especially when sex is involved--can be enlightenment enough. He dares to suggest, with a radical retelling of the Siddhartha tale at the film's close, that dogma can be a coward's way out. Sometimes, the serenest are also the ones who make the most ordinary noise.