Browse these Citysearch® Categories for products & services in your area.
Year Released 2007
Duration 120
Sponsored Links
Mongol
Editorial ReviewMovie Summary
Movie Genre:
Thriller/Crime
Rated:
MA
Director:
Sergei Bodrov
Starring:
Khulan Chuluun, Tadanobu Asano
Editorial Review
Before he launched a successful chain of BBQ restaurants, Genghis Khan killed 35-40 million people, starting with his 13-year-old brother. When he wasn't boiling his enemies alive or killing every male in a captured village, the tyrant was getting busy with his hundreds of wives and siring enough kids so that now - no shit - 0.5 percent of the world's population are his descendants.
Good luck gleaning any of this from Mongol, an oddly cuddly film that might be Genghis - The Wonder Years.
To be fair, the film's focus is on his younger self, when he was known as Temudjin and yet to conquer half the known world. But, even in this, writer-director Sergei Bodrov takes a strange approach. What we want to see is how this young man survived persecution, learned the ways of battle, escaped his oppression, forged those critical alliances and then kicked some serious ass. But Bodrov is much more interested in long depictions of his Temudjin's many defeats, captures and imprisonments and his devotion to his true love and the two children she had by other men.
Three problems with this: it makes Temudjin seem, well, hopeless; as a story it spins its narrative wheels; as history, it's simply suss. Little is known with certainty about Genghis's early life and Bodrov imagines him in sweetheart terms at the expense of detailing his strategies and campaigns. As such, we're asked to simply accept that after his chequered career, most of it spent as a slave or in exile, Genghis can simply get up from a picnic with his family and decide to conquer the globe. Cut to a few years later and he's doing just that, first step to the mass murder and bonk-frenzy so at odds with how the film has presented his personality.
The visuals and performances make it worth it, but this is a wilfully oblique bit of warrior hagiography.
Michael Adams
Tell us what you think
3 comments
Robert: Why is it not possible to get overall screening times on Citysearch for this movie or some of the cinemas???? (01 July 2008)
Rizal Dua Darah: I enjoyed this movie too, Harry. Temudjin (Genghis Khan) is portrayed without sympathy, in my opinion. He was arrogant, selfish, & manipulative, & had a vague plan to bring order to his people. Strip back many leaders of today & you'll find the same. It's nice to see a film shot outdoors with minimal(thankfully) CGI. (29 June 2008)
Harry Georgatos: This is a raw, visceral, intense film with images that scorch off the screen. I was compelled into the universe of Genghis Khan that the director created on screen with his cinematographer. It is a pure visual film with little dialogue. The viewer is swept into a world that reminded me of "Mad Max" with strong influences with Kurasawa's "The Seven Samurai". This is what cinema should be about. (20 June 2008)
Request removal of a review
Newsletter