Mongol: The Rise of Genghis Khan (2007)
"Mongol" (original title)

The story recounts the early life of Genghis Khan who was a slave before going on to conquer half the world including Russia in 1206.

Director:

Sergey Bodrov

Writers:

Arif Aliyev, Sergey Bodrov

Stars:

Tadanobu Asano, Honglei Sun, Khulan Chuluun

Nominated for 1 Oscar. Another 11 wins & 8 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Tadanobu Asano	...	Temudjin
Honglei Sun	...	Jamukha
Khulan Chuluun	...	Börte
Aliya	...	Oelun - Temudjin's Mother
Ba Sen	...	Esugei - Temudjin's Father
Amadu Mamadakov	...	Targutai
He Qi	...	Dai-Sechen
Ben Hon Sun	...	Monk
Ji Ri Mu Tu	...	Boorchu
You Er	...	Sorgan-Shira (as A You Er)
Huntun Batu	...	Altan (as Hong Jong Ba Tu)
Deng Ba Te Er	...	Daritai (as E Er Deng Ba Te Er)
Bao Di	...	Todoen
Su Ya La Su Rong	...	Girkhai (as Su You Le Si Ren)
Sai Xing Ga	...	Chiledu

Storyline

The movie is an epic story of a young Genghis Khan and how events in his early life lead him to become a legendary conqueror. The 9-year-old Temüjin is taken on a trip by his father to select a girl as his future wife. He meets Börte, who says she would like to be chosen, which he does. He promises to return after five years to marry her. Temüjin's father is poisoned on the trip, and dies. As a boy Temüjin passes through starvation, humiliations and even slavery, but later with the help of Börte he overcomes all of his childhood hardships to become one of the greatest conquerors the world has ever known.

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Plot Keywords:

genghis khan | epic | slave | betrayal | battle | 

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Taglines:

Greatness comes to those who take it.

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Genres:

Biography | Drama | History | War

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for sequences of bloody warfare

Details

Official Sites:

CTB Film Company/Kinofabrika Official site [jp]

Country:

Russia Germany Kazakhstan

Language:

Mongolian Mandarin

Release Date:

20 September 2007 (Russia)

Also Known As:

Mongol: The Rise of Genghis Khan

Filming Locations:

China

Box Office

Budget:

$20,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

£185,364 (UK) (6 June 2008)

Gross:

$5,701,643 (USA) (5 September 2008)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Kinokompaniya CTB, Andreevsky Flag Film Company, X-Filme Creative Pool

Technical Specs

Runtime:

126 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital EX

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Due to the isolation in which the film was made, viewing dailies was impossible. Exposed footage had to be sent to Hamburg in Germany to be processed, and then sent back to China for viewing, a process which took three weeks (usually dailies are processed and returned in 24 hours)

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Goofs

Non-Mongolian characters in this movie speak modern standard Mandarin Chinese. This would be incorrect because, this language as the standard Chinese language originates with the Qing Dynasty hundreds of years later, the regions depicted in the movie appear to be central and western China where they would speak a different dialect and several characters speaking Chinese don't appear to be Chinese and all and would most likely be speaking a Turkic dialect.

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Quotes

Jamukha: I want to ask you: All Mongols fear the thunder... but not you?
Temudjin: I had no place to hide from the thunder... so I wasn't afraid anymore.

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Connections

Referenced in Who Wants to Be a Millionaire: Episode #7.12 (2008)

User Reviews

Look up your history before you knock this

To the above two comments.

You know how they say history was written by the victors? That's true for everyone but the Mongols. Most of their history was written by the Chinese, Russians, Arabs, and other conquered peoples who had an interest in perpetuating Genghis Khan = bloodthirsty savage.

The movie is based on one of the few sources about Genghis khan written in Mongolian. It's called the secret history of the Mongols and was written shortly after he died as a record for the Mongolian royal family. He was just a chieftain's's son of a very minor tribe. That's what makes this story so impressive, he didn't start out as a king or a prince with a huge army, like Alexander. Everything he had, he had to earn. He didn't get to be Genghis Khan until he was in his 30's. He was always aware of how victory wasn't assured but had to be paid for with planning and strategy. He wasn't a saint by any means but he wasn't an unthinking savage. This movie is actually meant to be the first in a trilogy with the second one probably detailing his conquest of north china and the third the conquest of the Khwarezim empire in Iran and Afghanistan.

This is an approach that I like because the Alexander movie died on account of it trying to condense all of his conquests into one movie.