Aśoka (2001)

Best movie of this year hands down!

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

I understand that movies are made for the sake of entertainment, but I am ashamed that the only type of entertainment that is appreciated by Indian viewers is romance, which this movie is really about. I read the comments section of this movie and I see a lot of people make excuses to why so much romance was involved in what should have been a serious dramatization of Asoka the tyrant and Asoka the saint. They say that without romance the movie would not have been entertaining. The ones that say this likely have never seen the real good stuff such as Lawrence in Arabia. Seriously, imagine Lawrence of Arabia movie, not imagine if several scenes portraying his multilayered character were replaced with some romantic scenes with a scantily clad beauty in the desert. That movie would have been laughed at globally. A similar form of adulteration was done in the plot of Asoka. I am startled by the kind of praise this movie has received despite the utter dilution and corruption of topic at hand. The problem with general Indian audience is they do not even know what makes a good movie. If someone made the movie Asoka without romance and mostly focusing on conquests and spiritual messages, the same fans who are praising this movie would have loved it and probably called their all time favorite. Problem with Indian movie making industry is you very rarely get movies that have been flawlessly directed and focused on a certain topic. This has made the fanbase laud mediocrity. I am terribly disappointed in Santosh Sivan who went this route, possibly at the behest of producers. I do not doubt Sivan's credentials, but someone like Gowariker would have probably made a far superior flick by condensing the romance to about 10% of what we saw. Sivan and SRK probably took this route to earn profits, but this movie was a huge disappointment at the box office. I believe that if this movie got a Gowariker treatment where he would not give two f***s about catering to the masses, the movie would have done much better.

I rented this movie because the text on the cover appealed to me. It was speaking about the transformation of a King who lived in the 3rd century India and turned from a warrior to a Buddhist and then helped to spread the message. I also suspected from the cover that it is a grand epic, based on a true story I didn't hear about so far. I got the epic part right, there were plenty of action, battle scenes. But I was disappointed because the Buddhist years of Asoka's kingdom were not pictured at all. Instead the whole movie was focusing on the love story thread.(Side track: My house mate walked in while I was watching the movie and said he was "in love" when he saw the actress playing the king's love interest, Kareena Kapoor, granddaughter of legendary Raj Kapoor.) I was hoping to see how Asoka transforms from the mightiest and bloodiest war hero to the calm Buddhist, but saw none of it. Thus it was not entirely believable for me, that just because he lost his true love and found her after the battle that would be enough to turn him into a meek person. And why did they have to put in the obligatory music-video-clip type of songs, all 5 of them. They were fun, but didn't add anything to the movie. To close on a plosive note I would like to acknowledge that it was shot beautifully and the cutting was modern. Mostof it was a treat for my eyes. A tad bit too long though with its 170 minutes.

Asoka (Without Sorrow), 2001, 171min, Dreamz Unlimited If you like Sparta 300 and Gladiator, you will love this movie. Writer-director Santosh Sivan set out to make this loosely historical epic young Emperor Asoka, one of the India's greatest emperors of the Maurya Dynasty from 273 BCE to 232 BCE.Though the story is largely fictional, Sivan uses actual historical figures and tells the story in the context of the events of the day. From its opening moments detailing Asoka's trust for the sword to the sumptuous splendor of the battlefield defining the skill of Asoka's swordsmanship, the visuals of the film Asoka are simply breathtaking. Blending an eye for detail in production design, Sivan brings the long-dead civilization back to life like no other Hindi film has done before. First and foremost, a big round of applause to not only Sivan for orchestrating this enjoyable historical jaunt and evocative cinematography, but also Manish Malhotra for the gorgeous costume design and John Kundan Pai for the beautiful production designs. Stunning ancient architecture, strategic use of curtains and lighting, and absolutely stunning garb work with the unique camera angles to bring the ancient era to light. Scholarly issues aside, this is the kind of film that defines the term 'masterpiece'– filled with spectacle and action, and telling a story of epic scope and humanity. Asoka is an enthralling and totally immersing production that will probably be viewed as a Hindi classic paving the way to films like Jodha Akbar.Asoka and Kaurwaki (unbeknown to her that he is indeed her love Pawan), gather their forces for the final show down confrontation known to history as the Battle of Kalinga, whose outcome decided the fate of civilization and destiny of Asoka. A man who began his life as an emperor but ended as a monk achieving what he dreamt of which is to become the greatest emperor in history, that is emperor of hearts. The reticence pays off near the end when screenwriter provides the characters with a provocative and literate debate about the nature of war.Though many will remember the film for its violent and edge-of-your-seat battles, there is a lot of humanity found within this film, which builds up nicely to the film's emotionally satisfying climax. Sivan chooses to devote a fair amount of time focusing on Asoka's worrier Princess Kaurwaki, played beautifully by Kareena Kapoor. Her character is as violent, sensual, and full of intrigue her counterpart Prince Asoka. This complex love relationship between two people from rival kingdoms is expanded upon from its historical reference to portray Kaurwaki as a strong willed and passionate woman. There are few of passionate (I say not enough) moments between Asoka and Princess Kaurwaki highlighted by the music sequences tossed in to balance out the brutal and savage war scenes (not to mention a smoking-hot wet scenes of Shahrukh and Kareena) making the film worthwhile to watch.What raises Asoka above the usual epic drama is not only the strength of its story but power of its performances. More on Isisbollywood RHK

600 horses, 50 elephants, 6,000 extras together on the battlefield, as another reviewer wrote, and they are not able to put together a decent battle scene. That is something of an achievement. The After-the-battle-scenes on the field were gritty and intense, but the actual battle was lousily edited and suffered from a ridiculous pseudo martial arts style in plastic-lookalike pieces of armor.The acting was terrible, even the extras hammed it up. Only redemption here was the Khalinga-General. I also have to admit that the evil Asoka was well done by Shahrukh Khan who otherwise either left a noticeable amount of slime on the screen when not totally overacting.The story was good but butchered, the dialogue awful, character development believable where the actors didn't strangle their characters to death, and set pieces worth millions were simply put to waste. I am sorry for that.It was my first Bollywood experience. Some call this to be a finest among Bollywood Movies. If this is the case, I better skip the rest of the bunch. Horrible.