In Mongol, director Sergei Bodrov challenges our assumptions about Genghis Khan with the help of the emperor of cool, Tadanobu Asano.
You don't have to be a historian to watch Mongol and suspect that director Sergei Bodrov took some artistic license with the story of Genghis Khan (birth name: Temudgin). However, when dealing with an oral tradition-based culture from 800 years ago, where nothing is definitively documented and the few sources available are often conflicting or laced with their own divine agendas, it seems that history requires a little imagination. Or, at the very least, some educated guessing.
Conceived as the first installment of a trilogy, the two-hour film spans the first forty-four years of Temudgin's life: how he survived a difficult childhood (when he was enslaved with a cangue by his deceased father's former allies), went to war over his first great love (and rescued his wife Börte when she was captured by the Merkits), rose to power by defeating his former blood-brother to unite warring Mongol clans, and eventually earned the title of Genghis Khan. (His official Mongolian name is Chinggis Khaan, which loosely translates to "universal ruler.")
Over the four-year process of making the film, director Bodrov conducted extensive research on Genghis Khan. Growing up in Russia, Bodrov remembered his textbooks always portraying Genghis Khan as an uncivilized barbarian, ruthlessly seizing territories with little concern for his slaughtered victims. Skeptical about these one-dimensional historical representations, he began to read more about the legendary figure, and it struck him that because nomadic Mongolians of that time passed down their stories orally, the majority of written accounts on Genghis Khan that exist today have been filtered through the lenses of the West. To draft their version, he and Arif Aliyev, his co-writer on Prisoner of the Mountains, referred to The Secret History of the Mongols , a Mongolian text which places Khan's life in a more revered light. But even The Secret History of the Mongols is considered to be unreliable. Written by an anonymous author near the time of Khan's death in 1227, it incorporates elements of folklore and poetry and is full of contradictions. But it was also this text that introduced more human stories of Temudgin's youth, suggesting a complexity in character that can't be simplified into a stereotype of a savage.
These gaps in history lead to endless speculation about what really happened and explain why some cultures honor him as a god while some see him a notorious warmonger who raped, pillaged, and massacred millions without pity. In taking on this story, Bodrov wanted to present a more authentic, three-dimensional representation of Genghis Khan, but ironically, when Mongolians heard about a Russian filmmaker wanting to tell their story, Bodrov was met with the same type of skepticism that he himself had possessed when reading other "outsider" perspectives. Despite translating the script into Mongolian and making the effort to get permission from Mongolia's chief shaman at Ulan Bator, Variety reported in 2005 that Mongols were protesting the production, accusing Bodrov of "profaning and humiliating the national pride of the Mongolian people."
It might not have helped that Bodrov was planning to cast a Japanese actor Tadanobu Asano as Khan and a Chinese actor Honglei Sun as Khan's blood-brother-turned-adversary Jamukha. Faced with scandal, and frustrated that his genuine intentions were being overlooked, Bodrov shot the majority of the film in China's Inner Mongolia. While he included many Mongolians in the cast -- including Khulan Chuluun (Börte) and Odnyam Odsuren, who plays Temudgin as a child -- he mostly relied on Russian crew and shot with Russian, Kazakh, and German money.
The resultant film -- officially considered co-production between Russia, Kazakhstan, Germany, and Mongolia -- was met with positive reception from the West, even earning Kazakhstan a Best Foreign Language Film Oscar nomination earlier this year. Most critics concentrated their praise on technical successes of the film -- the acting, storytelling, and non-CGI battle sequences -- not taking issue with any perceived historical inaccuracies. Perhaps this is because there's a certain mythical spirit that is expected within the genre of the epic -- along the lines of a Braveheart, 300, or Gladiator -- so while this version of Genghis Khan might be more of a "gentle family man" than we expected, it's okay because after all, it's just a movie, and he still kills a lot of people in exciting ways.
In any case, without the ability to judge the accuracy of a history that is in itself so full of irretrievable answers, what stands out most about Bodrov's particular interpretation of Genghis Khan is his casting of Asano as his lead conqueror.
Asano is an unlikely and bold choice, not just because of his ethnicity, but because his onscreen persona doesn't necessarily scream 12th century warrior. Over his two-decade-long career, he's usually described with words like "cult actor," "indie idol," "misfit," "bad boy," "loner," "rebel," and "offbeat." He's played his share of killers, but more of those along the lines of bleached-blonde homicidal sado-masochists that embody twisted dimensions of the human psyche, as opposed to larger-than-life military leaders riding horseback and bludgeoning their enemies with spears.
In interviews, Bodrov tries to downplay any controversy over Asano's casting, not wanting to plant bait for naysayers who might have preferred this film to be a Mongolian production with an all-Mongolian cast.
"I was looking for the best actor," Bodrov told the Moscow Times when the film opened in Astana, Kazakhstan. "It didn't matter to me whether he was Mongolian. He had to be Asian, and he had to be the best."
In the film's production notes, Bodrov says: "I was looking for [someone] who would catch my eye and who would have this certain power. And Asano, of course, is a very special guy."
All vague answers, but basically, it boils down to a particular quality that Asano brings to all his movie roles, whether he's playing a man who is having trouble killing his wife or a high-voltage superhero. He somehow always just appears cool, no matter what he's doing. And effortlessly so, even when his characters are ridiculous or terrifying.
Whether he's recording train sounds (Café Lumiere), inventing creative half-hearted attempts to commit suicide (Last Life in the Universe), cutting his own tongue off with a knife (Ichi the Killer), or avoiding Clint Eastwood movies (An LA Times interview quotes his manager father lamenting Asano's failure to land a part in Letter from Iwo Jima because "he didn't want it badly enough," to which Asano just shrugs.), we as an audience accept him, support his idiosyncrasies, and just kind of go with it. He doesn't have to talk much to appear intelligent, doesn't have to do much to exude confidence. He seems indifferent but somehow still convinces us that he's trustworthy. It's Asano. That's the only explanation we need.
For this particular portrayal of Genghis Khan, this type of thinking works because the world of Mongol is one that is encased in steep traditions. There are codes of conduct that not only must not be broken, but must not be questioned. The audience too must not question them, even though our modern-day sensibilities would suggest there are gaps in logic in these rules. In one of the early scenes in the film, Temudgin's father makes a stubborn point of drinking a cup of water that he is offered out of faux hospitality, even when one of his men warns him that it might be poisoned. No matter what, he says, Mongols must always follow their customs. Later when the young Tedmudgin is captured by his enemies who want him dead, they insist on keeping him alive until he's grown, because Mongolian law doesn't allow the killing of women or children.
This attitude carries over to Mongol's script and storytelling technique. One can expect a film of such scope to gloss over details, but Mongol comfortably leaves gaping holes and assumes the audience can fill them in themselves. In one shot, a young Tedmugin falls through thin ice into a deep ocean of water; in the next shot, a young Jamukha finds Tedmugin lying unconscious on top of the unbroken ice. The adult Tedmugin talks to Tengri, the sky god, who takes the form of a wolf in the sky and makes sure things work out. And sometimes Börte kills guards, and we don't know how.
In the same way, Asano's Temudgin is very direct and straightforward in his actions, and the film operates under the assumption that the audience will accept his sparse explanations, or lack thereof.
When Börte is captured, Jamukha tells him that Mongols don't wage wars over women. He can get three new women in a heartbeat. No, is all Temudgin says, I want Börte.
When two of Jamukha's warriors abandon him for Tedmugin's clan, Jamukha (his sworn blood brother) feels betrayed. I can't send them back to you, Tedmugin says. Mongols have a right to choose their leader.
After having a tender moment, finally reunited with Börte and children, he tells his wife that he must leave. He must unite the Mongol people.
There aren't any of the dramatics or impassioned speeches one might assume would come with blood-brother betrayal, grandiose love stories, and a marathon of imprisonment, escape, and revenge. Instead, there's the sense that justification isn't needed because they are merely following codes of behavior; their callings are pre-determined by fate. Even without dialogue, Asano's onscreen presence is enough to command attention. His inner cool directly translates into Genghis Khan's inner strength. Asano's Tedmugin says, "Mongols need laws. I will make them obey -- even if I have to kill half of them," and we follow.
It's likely not an accident that the stoicism, mysteriousness, and monosyllabic-ness that critics associate with Asano's "inner strength" as Genghis Khan, is suspiciously similar to the "soothing monotone" and "benumbed expressions" that other critics appreciated about his roles as intriguing psychopaths and demented recluses in other films. Asano has always possessed the ability to display a sense of stoicism that could just as easily be comforting, mischievous or disturbing.
This balancing act bodes well for director Bodrov, especially when you think of Mongol as being the first in a trilogy. Mongol in essence is just the beginning: an underdog survival story and a romantic love story combined with a few large-scaled battle sequences -- before Temudgin's ascension to the throne, before the Mongol empire spread across Asia to Central Europe, before his legions of other wives diluted the romantic fantasy of his first-love and advisor Börte. With the critical acclaim that Part One has been getting, we can be hopeful that Bodrov will get the opportunity to finish the story that he started. Bodrov promises that the film version of Genghis Khan, the later years, will be dark. And if he can get Asano back for the next installments, it should be pretty compelling to watch.
For APA's Top Ten Tadanobu Asano moments, click here.