Before the action starts, the Bollywood movie “Mohenjo Daro” assures us that no animals were harmed during its making. More unusual, a note tells us that the film doesn’t support or dispute any specific interpretation of ancient Indian civilization. This disclaimer probably isn’t necessary. From its first scenes, the movie, set in 2016 B.C., makes its intentions known: This is a hero’s tale, not history.
In those opening scenes, Sarman(the green-eyed pinup Hrithik Roshan) has a David-like victory over an enormous crocodile, whose superior strength is no match for Sarman’s cunning, courage and well-placed trident. All in a day’s work: We soon learn that Sarman is his village’s go-to man in life-threatening crises.
Like all good heroes, Sarman is an orphan(he lives with his aunt and uncle). He doesn’t have a lightning bolt on his forehead, but he has a dream — of a unicorn, which is a clear sign of something ominous, as we see in the worried eyes of his aunt and uncle.
Our country boy soon goes off to the big city, Mohenjo Daro, a place he is told is ruled by greed. There he partakes of the polyglot marketplace, witnesses injustice, sees magnificent beasts(horses, brought by traders from Bukhara) and meets … a girl, the Chosen One, played by Pooja Hegde.(Chosen for what, you may wonder: her role consists of being fought over by men.)
The real Mohenjo Dara, in what is now Pakistan, comes complete with historical mysteries: why was this city abandoned and why did the Indus Valley civilization, which dates from the third millennium B.C., fade? Whoever the residents of Mohenjo Daro were — and that’s not clear — they had “a reverence for the control of water, ” as an article in National Geographic says. They had good drainage. And pools.
“Mohenjo Daro, ” written and directed by Ashutosh Gowariker, isn’t really interested in how the city worked, or in its ancient bells and whistles. Mr. Gowariker’s mind is more on the standard-issue romance between Sarman and the Chosen One, and Sarman’s heroic tests.
Which is to say that “Mohenjo Daro” is a typical Bollywood epic-adventure-musical-romance, if one with a novel setting. Mr. Roshan, an appealing dancer, works hard to twinkle his way into our affections and make Sarman something more than a cardboard hero. He can’t, but the effort is appreciated.