Film details

A King in China

Joseph Francis Rock was one of the last classic explorers of the 20th century, arriving in western China in 1922 at a unique moment in history as the doors were briefly opened to foreigners. Living in wild and troubled provinces in a chaotic nation, Rock explored the mountainous regions along the Chinese-Tibetan borderlands, areas unknown to the West. Always looking for his own personal Shangri-La, he found it amongst the Naxi, an ethnic minority in Southwest China, spending half of his life preserving their unique pictographic script.