43. Potomok Chingis-Khana/Storm Over Asia (1928)

Running Time: 125 minutes
Directed By: Vsevolod Pudovkin
Written By: Osip Brik, I. Novokshenov
Main Cast: Valery Inkijinoff, I. Dedintsev, Aleksandr Christyakov, Viktor Tsoppi, F. Ivanov

LONG LIVE GENGHIS KHAN

With Storm Over Asia finished, I'm left with only three movies until I reach the 1930's and I must say Storm Over Asia was not an enjoyable film for me at all.

Valery Inkijinoff plays the unamed hero, a mongol who is sent by his father into western Europe to sell a rare silver fox fur. Before leaving his father instructs him to not accept anything less than 500 silvers for the fox pelt. Upon arriving in Europe, the mongol is swindled out of the fur by a crooked trader and ends up getting into a fight with the white man, drawing blood on one of them. He is ushered off into the mountains where he must hide, as the white man is dead set on getting vengeance for his spilled blood.

Once in the mountains, the mongol falls in with a group of partisans and helps them fight against the occupying British army. He is eventually captured by the British and ordered to be shot and killed. He's taken high up into the mountains where he is shot, but soon after the British realize, through a document that the mongol carried on his person, that he is a direct descendant of Genghis Khan, the ancient warrior. The British soldiers are ordered by their commanding officers to go and find him and they do, finding him still clinging to life after being shot several times.

Storm Over Asia started out as a fair movie. A young mongolian herdsmen who takes a journey to the local bazaars to sell a silver fox pelt...simple enough. But then they throw in a lot of mumbo jumbo about Genghis Khan, soviet partisans, British armies, lama's...etc. and my proverbial umbilical cord to this movie was severed. This film also had some fairly good cinematography, but not enough to make up for the boring plot that nearly put me to sleep faster than an overdose of NyQuill. These Russian propoganda films are really getting on my nerves, with first Eisenstein, and now Pudovkin, I've had my fair share and am ready to move on and quit hearing about rebellions and revolutions.

RATING: 1.5/10 Not the worst film I've seen thus far out of the book, but damn close. Recommendation to avoid.

NEXT UP: Blackmail...The first of eighteen...yes 18!!...Hitchcock films in the book

October 22, 2009 8:52pm