The Raid 2: Berandal review

"OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD! Its finally came out! I could finally watch it!" Is my initial reaction when The Raid 2 finally came out in the Indonesian theater. This movies has been my most anticipated and hyped movie in recent years for a reason, The Raid is awesome and the sequel is aiming for a bigger, better and absolutely batshit insane actions and boy did they deliver it in such explosive way. No wonder some people called this movie as the Dark Knight of action movies because despite my soaring expectation for The Raid 2, it still manage to even top that expectation.

For those who haven't watched the first movie, have no fear because the first movie barely had any story and the connection between the first and the second movie is like the connection between amish peoples and the internet. You will only need to hear some explanation and you'll be good enough to follow this movie story. If you are not a native Indonesian speaker. never use "I don't watch subtitled movie" as a reason to not watch this masterpiece. Go see it now! With that done, here's my review for The Raid 2.

The raid 2 literally took place like 3 hours after the ending of the first movie. To protect his family from the mob, Rama (Iko Uwais) must go undercover and befriends the son of the leader of the mobs, Uco (Arifin Putra) and infiltrates the organization from the inside to find any evidence related to the mob activity and police corruption inside. After 2 awesome fight scenes and 2 years later, Rama becomes Uco trusted man and he joined the mob, break more bones and gained their trust. Things doesn't go all well because Uco ambition to be the leader of the mob triggers a conflict with their rival, The Japanese mob. Rama must punch, broke and stabs more people in order to survive the chaos and bring the end to the the gang war and police corruption in Jakarta.

If the first movie feels like a claustrophobic survivor horror movie with the addition of Indonesian martial art called Silat, The Raid 2 feels much more bigger in every ways possible and it might be one of the goriest action movie in this recent years. For an action movie, the duration of The Raid 2 is super long, clocking in at two and a half hour which sound really worrying at first but i can assure you that those two and a half hour will went by as fast as the breeze of wind in the morning because the pacing of the movie is superb. I never feel like the movie drags too long or stuck in nowhere, in fact i wish that the movie is longer so it can show more actions and character interactions.

I watched every Gareth Evans movies right from Merantau which is also about 2 hours long and i remember Merantau story to be bogging down the actions part to the level where i wish i could fast forward to the great action parts in that movie. I was worried that the same thing will happen in The Raid 2, but while the story in it is at best serviceable and at worst still bogging down the actions, the characters is what kept my attention glued to the movie. The movie is full of memorable characters like the psychopath Uco as the mob boss son's, Bangun the leader of the Jakarta Mob (Tio pakusadewo), Prakoso as an assassin  who look like a hobo and for some reason married to a super hot woman (Yayan Ruhian aka Mad dog from the first movie), and two of my favorite characters Hammer Girl (Jullie Estelle) and Baseball Bat Man (Very Tri Yulisman) who in my opinion is two of the most memorable characters from the movie.

And no, i don't like baseball bat man because it sounds like Batman learn silat and went nuts with a baseball bat

Performances wise, i won't sugar coating it because admittedly the performances is quite a mixed bags. Some performances are actually pretty good especially from Arifin Putra as Uco and Tio Pakusadewo as the mob boss but Iko as the main lead and Yayan as Prakoso...well, not so good. Don't get me wrong, when they are in a fight scene they totally sold it but since the movie shows more drama now, it become more apparent that they are not a good actor, yet. Despite that, i genuinely feels emotionally invested with their characters because i really feels Rama angers and his descent into the madness of the underworld and i feel very sympathetic with Prakoso story. What i want to say is they can be better and i really wanna see them getting better because i genuinely thinks that they might be the next Jackie Chan of martial art movie, with a touch of brutality that is. Jullie Estelle as the hammer girl is still my favorite though because she is so cool in every scenes she is in even when she never once sprout a word (Hammer girl is mute and deaf after all) yet her performance is subtle and striking. The fact that she is downright gorgeous might be one of the winning factor too.

Do hammer me anytime you want Jullie...

And of course, what is The Raid without its actions part? The prison riot, the subway fight, the car chase, the 2 on 1 fight between Rama, Hammer Girl and Baseball Bat Man, and the final fight scene are just mind blowing. There is a lot of moment where i go "how the hell did they film this scene?". It  took me to a time where movies are magical wonders before CG takes over the creativity of practical effects. Talking about The Raid 2 action scenes will be an understatement because by God you need to experience it by yourself. We are talking about some of the best and brutal action scenes that ever been put in the cinema level here and Gareth Evans really shot them beautifully. To think that they managed to craft such a masterpiece with only 4.5 million dollar compared to the waste of 200 million dollar in every Michael Bay movie shows that creativity always defeat budget anytime in the days.

It might sound that this movie is perfect but its not. There is quite a moment where i kinda go nitpicking some little flaw here and there like the strange scenes involving the snow which if you remember your geographical lesson, Indonesia is a tropical country and  the snows that just came out from nowhere serves not much of a purpose but making me raising my eyebrow in confusion. The Raid 2 will also be hated because the level of the brutality portrayed almost looks like 80's slasher movies and it certainly turned off many peoples from watching it. Some foreigner who aren't used to watch a subtitled movie also might see it as a negative but honestly, to hell with those guys! I've been watching subtitled movie for my entire life and i still able to enjoy all kind of movies just fine. If you said that you don't wanna watch one of the best action movie ever because it is subtitled then learn to read or you'll missed one of the best experience that a movie can offer!

This movie makes me literally giggling in happiness every time i saw some amazing set pieces back when i watched it in the cinema. In our way back home, me and my friends spent like hours talking about the movie with a big passion even though most of my friend who watched it with me aren't a big fan of movies in general. The Raid 2 is a movie made with a passion of its director, actors, crews and all the staffs and in the end that passions were delivered to the audiences through the movie. If a movie managed to make you feel passionate just from watching it then i said it deserves a place in my heart.

Initial El score's

10

A place in my tiny little empty heart