Aravt is a 2012 film from Mongolia directed by I. Shagdarsuren and D. Zolbayar.
It is set during the time that Genghis Khan was consolidating control of the Mongol tribes, so, sometime around 1200 or shortly thereafter. The Khan gives an order to Tsahir, the leader of a ten-man squad—called an "aravt"—in the Khan's army. With plague on the loose in Mongolia, the aravt has been tasked with finding a particular "master physician" and bringing him back to treat the sick. It is not that easy a task. Genghis has just won a victory against the Khulin tribe and brought them under his control, but elements of the Khulin army are still out in the field.
The aravt passes a couple of burnt-out yurts, seeing the corpses of the people who lived there. Soon after, a band of Khulin led by a man named Khukhtumur comes across the scene. The dead woman lying outside the yurt is the wife of Kharkhor, son of Khukhtumur and one of their band. The Khulin make the logical but incorrect assumption that the aravt of Genghis's men did it. Kharkhor swears vengeance, and chases after the aravt. Tsahir and his aravt, at first unaware that they are being chased, stumble across a baby in the bushes—Kharkhor's missing son.
Some sources refer to this film under the alternate title Genghis: Legend of the Ten, or Aravt: Ten Soldiers of Genghis Khan.
Tropes:
- Audible Sharpness: Done several times when Mongol warriors are pulling daggers and short swords out of scabbards.
- Doorstop Baby: The aravt stumbles across a baby boy in the bushes, and carries him around for a while. Unlike many examples of this trope this doesn't really drive the story, except that it gives Kharkhor extra motivation to catch them.
- Dramatic Drop: Unumunkhei dramatically drops her jug of milk when she is told that her grandfather the Master Physician was killed.
- Enemy Eats Your Lunch: One of the aravt takes a moment in the middle of the big climactic fight, stopping to take a joint of meat off a fire and take a big bite. Then he drops the meat, spins around, and kills a guy.
- Eye Scream: In the big fight scene at the end, one of the Khulin takes an arrow straight to the eye.
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Kheekher dies when one of the Khulin drives a spear completely through him and out the front side.
- In the Back: The Master Physician is having a surreptitious conversation with one of the aravt (the Physician is at the crest of a hill and the soldier is on the far slope) when, out of nowhere, he is shot in the back with an arrow. It comes as a complete surprise and the reason isn't explained until the end.
- Living MacGuffin: The Master Physician. The bit about needing a doctor to fight an epidemic is really just an excuse to get the story going. The epidemic is forgotten about, and when the Master Physician is killed halfway through the movie, it hardly influences the story at all.
- Narrator: A narrator is occasionally heard providing exposition, like explaining that the ten man "aravt" squad was the smallest unit in Genghis's army, or explaining that Genghis has just won a victory and conquered the Khulin but there are still parts of the Khulin army on the loose.
- The Reveal: A lot of the stuff that happens doesn't immediately make any sense. Who killed Kharkhor's wife and took the baby? Who killed the Master Physician, and why would anybody kill him? Eventually it's revealed that Bukha, a lieutenant with the Khulin tribe, has done it all. He killed all those people and organized events so that he could eventually kill Kharkhor and Kharkhor's father, Khukhtumur, and succeed them as leader of the Khulin tribe.
- Riding into the Sunset: The film ends with the aravt galloping off into the setting sun, as the narrator muses that there were many aravt, little ten-men squads writing the history of Mongolia.
- Scenery Porn: The pristine countryside of Mongolia—river valleys, rolling steppe, craggy hills, little changed since the time of this movie—is shown to maximum advantage.
- The Starscream: Bukha, who killed his chief Khukhtumur and Khuhutumur's son Kharkhor, so that Bukha could take over as chief of the Khulin.
- The Smurfette Principle: There is one woman in the cast: Unumunkhei, the Master Physician's granddaughter. She doesn't have much to do except be a Damsel in Distress.
- Taking the Bullet: The demented Bukha is about to shoot the baby with an arrow when Bukhtenger, who has been looking over the baby the whole time, leaps in front of an arrow. He is shot and dies.
