Knight of Cups Through the Lens of Indian Philosophy—A Journey to the Self Terrence Malick’s Knight of Cups is a film that resists easy interpretation. Its fragmented, poetic narrative leaves much of its meaning open to the viewer’s personal reflections. At its core, however, the film is a spiritual odyssey—a story about the search for meaning, the struggle to overcome distractions, and the possibility of redemption. While the film’s parable of the prince and the pearl draws from Gnostic philosophy, its themes resonate just as deeply with Sanatan Dharm, the eternal philosophy of Indian thought. Concepts such as माया (illusion),