In 2007 and 2008, Jigme Gyatso assisted Tibetan filmmaker Dhondup Wangchen in the making of "Leaving Fear Behind", a documentary film which interviewed Tibetan people on their opinions of the Dalai Lama and the Chinese government in the months preceding the 2008 Beijing Olympics. In March, they had completed filming and just smuggled the tapes out of Lhasa, the Tibetan capital, when riots erupted and began to spread through Tibetan-inhabited areas of China. As part of the government response that followed, both Jigme Gyatso and Dhondup Wangchen were detained on March 28 in Tong De, Qinghai Province.