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Asoka
***1/2
Cinema Releases - October 26, 2001
Rated on a 4-star scale. Certificate 12. 157
minutes. Directed by Santosh Sivan. Written by Saket Chaudhary, Santosh Sivan.
Starring Shah Rukh Khan, Kareena Kapoor, Danny Dezongpa, Hrishita Bhatt,
Rahul Dev.
King Asoka, who ruled India from 270 to 237 B.C.,
is legendary as one of the first royal patrons of Buddhism, a man who in
his later years made it his quest to spread the message of peace across his
homeland and the rest of the world. "Asoka" is a terrific new
movie that shows how he got to that point -- his years as a wandering prince,
when he roamed the countryside and fell in love, then became a madman, killed
challengers to the throne, waged epic war on Kalinga, then finally came to
his senses and embraced religion.
Hindi films have steadily been getting more popular
in Britain, moving out of specialist video shops and gaining exposure in
the multiplexes of such cities as Bradford and Birmingham. "Lagaan" made
some appearances in the nation's weekly list of the ten highest-grossing
films, and now we have "Asoka", which is the first Hindi movie to get a
nationwide release date and to play in a good number of cinemas across the
country.
It is a wonderful piece of work -- bold, rich,
vibrant, passionate, epic. It clearly cost more than the average 'Bollywood'
flick, runs for 157 minutes and has impressed the film community enough to
enter the international festival circuit. Shah Rukh Khan plays the title
role and Kareena Kapoor is his love interest; they're stars in India, and
clearly actors with both skill and sex appeal. There are big, bloody battle
scenes, a couple of musical numbers, and drama involving both political struggles
and personal difficulties. Any of this may seem melodramatic to audiences
conditioned to accept the timidity of Western cinema, but I welcome and praise
it even more than "Moulin Rouge" -- it has as many grand gestures and a much
more involving story.
The distribution and publicity for "Asoka" have
not been perfect. I doubt that Odeon will leave it on their screens for more
than a week or two, and I haven't seen a poster for it anywhere except the
cinema corridor. But the fact of its wide release is an important step. Bollywood
pictures may seem strange to us -- they are allowed to feature belly-dancing,
but not onscreen kisses, and sometimes their fight sequences come right after
song-and-dance numbers -- but they are an important part of global culture,
and the more we recognise that the better.
COPYRIGHT©
2001 Ian Waldron-Mantgani
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