Nomad: The Warrior

There are many historical distortions in the movie. Biggest fiction is that Ablai Khan and Galdan never fought each other (Ablai Khan was born in 1711, where Galdan died in 1697). And Zhungars are not conquered by Kazakhs as shown in this movie! During Galdan's rule, Central Asian countries were no match to Zhungars-Mongols (even Khalkhas-Mongols).

The movie, itself is OK to watch. Just remember that it is a historic fiction movie.

Certainly NOMAD has some of the best horse riding scenes, swordplay, and scrumptious landscape cinematography you'll likely see, but this isn't what makes a film good. It helps but the story has to shine through on top of these things. And that's where Nomad wanders.

The story is stilted, giving it a sense that it was thrown together simply to make a "cool" movie that "looks" great. Not to mention that many of the main characters are not from the region in which this story takes place (and it's blatantly obvious with names like Lee and Hernandez). If movie makers want to engross us in a culture like the Jugars and the Kazaks, they damn well better use actors/actresses that look the part.

Warring tribes, a prophecy, brotherly love and respect, a love interest that separates our "heroes", are all touched on but with so little impact and screen time that most viewers will brush them aside in favor of the next battle sequence, the next action horse scene, or the breathtaking beauty of the landscape.

It is worth mentioning that there were some significant changes made to Nomad during its filming, specifically the director and cinematographer. Ivan Passer (director) was replaced by Sergei Bodrov, and Ueli Steiger (cinematographer) was replaced by Dan Laustsen. In one respect, Laustsen seems to have the better eye since his visions of the lands made the final cut that we see here. Definitely a good thing. However, the changing over to Bodrov as director may not have been the wisest choice. From what I'm seeing here, the focus is on the battles and not the people, which I sense comes from Bodrov's eyes and not Passer's. A true travesty.

The most shameful aspect is that this could've been a really fantastic film, with both character and action focuses. Unfortunately, the higher-ups apparently decided that action was what was needed and took the cheap (intellectually speaking) way out.

Even though I can't give this film a positive rating, it is worth watching simply for the amazing cinematography work. But that's all.

I would argue that there weren't many genuinely original concepts, other than simply shedding some light on Kazakh history. Basically a live action, feel-good version of the Prince of Egypt cartoon, trading Egyptians and Hebrews for nomadic Muslims. But that being said, it was decent and crisp.

Filming locations seemed really great, like LOTR - The Two Towers without any need for CGI! As for rating/violence, it could have almost been PG13 in the US, but I liked this fact. It was a clean-ish film that likens back to the spaghetti western. No over-the-top violence, sex, swearing, or embellishing for the sake of a Hollywood audience. While this generally comes off slightly cartoonish, it was refreshing.

As for the language, I would swear that it seemed to be filmed in English and dubbed in Kazakh. In fact, I don't usually mind a dubbed movie (especially Spanish or Japanese for some reason), but half-way through this film, I realized there was an English audio track and switched it over, and I was more engaged.

The horse work was pretty amazing, I thought.

Again, overall, this film seemed to have all the filming quality of an expensive Hollywood movie, but brought a niceness that's less common in contemporary film (Note: guaranteed NOT to hold the attention of most American youth).

This moviefilm of great success, produce by senior producer Azamat Bagatov tell famous story of how Kazakhstan was first nation to be pecked out of Giant Egg by Mighty Hawk Ukhtar and how Kazakhis later achieve domestication of woman.

Kazakhstan current has a very thrive industry of moviefilm production and has prove to world that has all the knowledges and facility need to make a blockbustering. Varied locations, beautiful scenery, and hardest working 7-year-olds in all Central Asia make this possible. And no need specials effects: battle scenes are made crushing real gypsys and Uzbekhis!

Great success!

If you've seen all the Hollywood blockbuster war films and are looking for more, this is an interesting period film with loving care put into costumes and sets. True, it didn't have a huge budget, but they clearly put a lot of time into it. If you only want blockbusters, you can skip this film. But if you want to see some history (and learn a little, too, if you're not Khazakh), then it's worth watching. It might be noted that Mansur appears to be an important historical figure for Khazakh - and a lot of their national agencies are listed in the credits. This makes it historical in more than one way - such a film probably wouldn't have been possible during the days of the USSR.