At long last, my wife and I got the chance to see this movie after it had been playing for almost 2 weeks. It was one of my highly anticipated film which unfortunately premiered on 29 August while we were on our holiday. Anyway, after we got back home, we opted to see this as our first movie we tried to catch up. Sadly though, the cinema where we usually see films with Dolby Atmos effect was not showing it last night at our available time, probably because of some events. OK, without further ado, let us get on with the movie.
Brief Story Line
Sancaka (Abimana Aryasatya - The Night Comes for Us, Sabtu Bersama Bapak etc) was a loner who worked as a security guard in a factory. He was quite a bitter person who did not like to be involved in other matters due to the hardship he had to endure since childhood. But when his neighbor Wulan (Tara Basro - Pengabdi Setan, 3 Srikandi etc) was being threatened by market thugs, he came to the rescue and made him the target of more thugs. Using the power of lightning that he somehow manage to control, Sancaka started to help other people and became the beacon of hope.
Meanwhile, a ruthless mafia named Pengkor (Bront Palarae - My Stupid Boss etc) who had most of the legislative members in his pocket was devising an evil plan together with his mysterious partner (Ario Bayu - Java Heat, 22 Menit etc). However, some of the legislative people led by Ridwan (Lukman Sardi - Wiro Sableng Pendekar Kapak Maut Naga Geni 212 etc) were trying to fend off Pengkor in their own ways.
Sancaka now had to face the greatest threat he could ever imagine, to save the country from Pengkor and his "army" of orphans assassins. So how would the story conclude? Find them all in this pretty decent superhero origin story.
End of Brief Story Line
Well this was quite an entertaining movie. It was a cool way to start the so called BumiLangit Cinematic Universe (BCU), a shared universe of characters from the various Indonesian comics which intellectual properties had been acquired by the company BumiLangit. With such a great hype especially for Indonesians who recognize some of these characters from our childhood years, plus the famous name of Joko Anwar to direct this movie & becoming the executive producer of future films, it was certainly a mouth watering event for us.
I personally was quite satisfied after seeing this movie. It had some cool fight scenes and I thought Abimana suit the character nicely, though it might have been better if his body was built up more buffy like in the comic. The origin story felt a bit different from the comics which was probably due to creative mind of Joko Anwar who also served as the writer, but it was not too bothersome for me. There were a lot of characters in here (sometimes felt a bit too many, especially the people of Legislative members). In fact the political aspect was the one true flaw to my opinion, since it sometimes felt a bit draggy. If it was shortened a bit and just show them in the background, I would have enjoyed the film even more.
Talking about the characters, aside from Abimana himself, I also felt Bront Palarae was quite decent in portraying the villain. Tara Basro was very natural in her role and I also quite enjoy the performance of Muzakki Ramdan (The Returning etc) as young Sancaka. But the scene stealers would have to be Pritt Timothy (Moonrise Over Egypt etc) as Sancaka's fellow security friend Pak Agung and Bimasena Susilo as the kid Teddy. Both of them truly brought the light in this otherwise pretty dark movie. There were also quite abundant well known actors and actresses who appeared briefly or as cameo in here.
I mentioned above that the fight scenes were done quite well. It should not come as a surprise since there was the name of Cecep Arif Rahman (John Wick Chapter 3: Parabellum, The Raid etc) as the fight choreographer. He also played as one of the many assassins who worked for Pengkor. The special effects were generally quite OK though one or two scenes looked pretty obviously done by computer (like the factory in early part, or the view from apartment). The sound effects were amazing even with Dolby Surround 7.1, but sometimes there were voices dubbed rather poorly (like my wife noticed) which made us felt like we were watching from a TV and strangely enough, it was sometimes difficult to listen to the words being said. There was no English subtitle either to help us.
The movie had quite a long duration of 123 minutes which should be pretty standard for a superhero movie nowadays. But due to some overly long scenes of the political part, it might become a bit too long for some people. It is categorized for 13+ which should be fine if the audience are really following this. However, as people tend to bring their children to see a superhero movie, be warned that some scenes might be a bit too disturbing for the young ones, plus there were some harsh languages as well. Other than those, there were not so much violence as other 17+ Indonesian movies.
Overall it was a pretty enjoyable film. It might not be spectacular enough for me personally, but it certainly had its moments that brought excitements, especially with what the future holds by the brief appearance of other superhero next in line. Oh there was a mid end credit scene which definitely should be seen. The BCU is looking to have a positive start with this movie, even with few flaws that I felt (including the weird situation involving Sancaka before the climax). And if I have to make a comparison with the shared universe from the Hollywood version, because of the darkness I felt from this film, it felt more like the movies of early DCEU period rather than the MCU. So, if you are fans of Indonesian comic superhero and want to see how the BCU would look like later, this one is not to be missed out.
Happy watching!
Mike's movie moments rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Thanks, Mike. A very helpful, honest review.
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