Santosh Sivan's Asoka is a film that continues to receive mixed reviews from my students every year. On the one hand, many find it quite entertaining. If this was your first Bollywood film, you may have found the style to be bit suprising-- like an American musical with an extra dose of adrenaline. I had a student in the past write that she didn't feel the film was historically accurate because she didn't think that people in India broke out into song and dance out of nowhere. Point #1- this student had not come to an appreciation of the Bollywood style. Point #2- don't you think the world would be a much more pleasant and enjoyable place if everyone did? Actually, I do break into song and dance on occasion in the hallways at North. It's actually quite theraputic. In terms of historical value, my students generally feel empty at the end of this film, one student even commenting that she felt like she knew even less about Asoka after the film than before. I must concur with these comments. While I found the film to be rather entertaining, the story of Asoka is so misrepresented that I feel that they should have just changed the name of Asoka and the rest of the main characters and just presented a traditional love story. This would have been better than masquerading the film as one of any historical relevance or educational value. This brings up a fairly interesting discussion point however. While I care little about discussing the actual film being called into question, the question remains: Why does Hollywood (or in this case Bollywood) constantly choose to alter historic events for the purposes of entertainment? Is being misled even entertaining? Does this even matter if the entertainment value is high? If, as the saying goes, fact is stranger than fiction, wouldn't films be more entertaining if they did maintain the fullest degree possible of historical integrity? When it comes to a film as historically inaccurate as Asoka, I think that this is an appropriate conversation to be had. If you did enjoy the Bollywood style of filmmaking, yet long for something more historically credible, I would recommend that you view Ashutosh Gowariker's Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India, a long but thoroughly enjoyable film.
12 comments:
I completely agree with the fact that Ashoka was historically inaccurate. Although the movie did warn in the beginning that it wasn't completely accurate. Some people might find the whole singing and dancing different but it isn't anything new to me. In bollywood movies there are always songs and dances during the middle, so it isn't inaccurate for that fact. I felt that when I looked closely, I saw that the inaccurate parts were to do with the costumes and order of events and the way things happen. I really felt that the movie didn't emphasize the converting of Ashoka to buddhism. If you think from the perspective of the moviemakers, you can't blame them for trying to save their average watchers from boredom. I've got to admit, though, that the love story was great and touching, but that should'nt have been a big point in the movie. The reason the filmmakers put more emphasis on the love story is because that's whats entertaining to most people. Also, I agree with Mr.Prill that Lagaan is an awesome movie.
i though that asoka was a weird and boring movie cause the whole thing was about getting ultimate power or singing or dancing lol. when i was in 5th grade i did a report on bollywood and i found a blog about it and 50 out of the 120 people said that it was all about singing and dancing
@ntf@arm... could you please edit your post with first and last name please. no pseudonyms please, otherwise i can't give you credit for your post.
Bollywood movies have other stuff in them other than singing and dancing..and to tell you the truth the singing and dancing makes them better to me..unless if there is to much of it.
Though this movie was horribly innacurate in a lot of places., it was pretty entertaining. Some of the events that occured in it shocked me, and the love story was semi-predictable. I definitely wouldn't recommend it to people who are actually trying to learn about the events of King Asoka's life and his journey and conversion into the Buddhism religion.
I agree with Nidhi. I love to watch people dance, and I think the many dance numbers added a nice point of interest to what would be an otherwise very boring film.
I would agree that for the sake of being a film, the director and producers would emphasize the love story and the battle scenes as opposed to focusing on historical accuracy, as it is common when turning books into movies. I would say the movie was mildly entertaining, the love story was nice and the plot wasn't bad, although at the end I felt like they really left out too many details to better shape the film and construct a base for parts I felt were spontaneous, instead of having everything come together. If they had payed a bit more attention to the history instead of adding so much detail in other parts of the story, it could have been better structured. A good film, but it had its flaws like all films.
Although this movie was pretty inaccurate it was quite entertaining. The singing and dancing was amusing like it is in all Bollywood movies. I was partly disappointed that the movie didn't really focus too much on Asoka's conversion into the Buddhist beliefs but rather his love for Kaurwaki.
I too found this film to be entertaining, I really didnt care of the historical inaccuracy because it was the summer.
I also agree that Asoka was extremely inaccurate but at the same time very entertaining. In my opinion the movie had more of a pop culture style rather than a historical one. The movie was full of unneccesary details about King Asoka's love life, instead of the actual historical events that occured throughout his factual history. But i do think that if the filmmakers would have added a little more in the movie about King Asoka's conversion and his spread of Buddhism, it would have been much better. I think the movie was made more for entertaining it's viewers and doesn't really focus on informing the viewers about the history of Asoka's ruling. But to be honest, if the moviemakers had made a movie that was mostly facts about King Asoka's life and not a fictional love story, the movie would have been pretty boring. Therefore, i think it's safe to say that without a little fiction in any movie,especially Asoka, it would not have been as amusing as it was.
Well, i thought that Asoka was quite entertaining even though the movie was inaccurate. The movie did have song and dance stuff but, thats quite normal in most indian movies lol. i did not like the ending of the movie though. i wanted to see what happend to kalinga after Arya died and what happend to Asoka himself. the love part of the story is only there for the entertainment, but i must agree it was way too long. At first i thought i would recommened it to other people. but then realised that it was to innacurate. it would have been usless if someone was trying to learn about him...i havn't seen Lagaan...
Well if you haven't seen Laagan then you must because it's a great movie about british rule in India. For guys its got an popular sport, cricket, it's awesome. It's true that the ending wasn't clear so it did sort of leave you hanging.I mean they don't even say if Asoka and Kaurwaki got married or something. But I'm guessing they did.I think Asoka had taken over Kalinga after Arya because Arya died after the war, which Asoka won.
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