Asoka
dir. Santosh Sivan
Dreamz Unlimited

This weekend at the movies, I felt like a kid again.

While watching Asoka, I realized this movie was taking me back to a time when I gleefully watched Steven Spielberg and George Lucas films with wonder and chuckles. I found myself carried along by a plot that had obvious flaws. I rooted for the main characters and hoped the bad ones would meet a bad end. I bought into the very PG love-at-first-sight romance.

How had this shimmering something lowered years of carefully cultivated defenses against Hollywood shlock?

Well, for starters, Asoka wasn't made in Hollywood, but in Bollywood. The most productive movie industry in the world isn't in California; it's in Mumbai. Those that are aware of Bollywood usually nurse a stereotype about its films: that they're sappy, B-grade films full of song-and-dance routines. Asoka shows that Bollywood films are becoming more and more like Hollywood blockbusters — sappy, A-grade films — while maintaining an Indian cultural identity.

Asoka embellishes on the shadowy history of one of India's most famous kings. Over 200 years before Christ, King Asoka ascended the throne of the Mauryan Empire after a power struggle with his brothers, and extended the imperial borders across the Indian subcontinent by conquering the rival state of Kalinga. As legend has it, the battle for Kalinga was so bloody that Asoka renounced war and dedicated his kingdom to Buddhist principles of nonviolence. He also sent numerous Buddhist monks to spread the religion beyond India, successfully converting much of east Asia.

The movie takes these bare threads of history and weaves in a love interest in a way reminiscent of Braveheart. Asoka's lover is a princess from Kalinga. The two become separated, with Asoka believing she is dead. The lovers' separation and reunion provide handy explanations for Asoka's conversion from badass to Buddhist saint.

Aside from the subtitles, the mainstream American movie-goer would feel right at home with Asoka. Besides the similarities to Braveheart, the movie also recalls Spy Kids-esque rapid editing and the high-tech flight fights made famous by Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

And Asoka has the same Hollywood penchant for plot flaws. We must suspend our disbelief that Asoka would not hear about his long-lost princess in rival Kalinga during the negotiations leading up to war. And we must accept the stupidity in disposing of a dangerous mystical sword by throwing it into a shallow stream for anyone to retrieve.

I have long since grown tired of these Hollywood tropes, but the Bollywood repackaging made it all fun again. Asoka offers plenty of Indian culture shocks and quirks to keep the experience fresh:

• In the midst of a scene, music might suddenly rise. This is your cue to sit back and take in a song-and-dance routine similar to a pop MTV video where the characters and extras transform into booty-shakers and caricatures.
• The hero is a bit more of a mama's boy than one would expect in an American film, and in general it's the females who wield the power.
• The movie stops for a pleasant intermission.
• Contrary to Hollywood visions of heroism, engaging in war is ultimately repudiated.

— Benjamin Arnoldy (benjamin@csmonitor.com)