Acensbart Excellent but underrated film

Glucedee It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.

Megamind To all those who have watched it: I hope you enjoyed it as much as I do.

StyleSk8r At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

lasttimeisaw Double bill time, Welsh filmmaker Gareth Evans has made a big splash with his action one-two punch which puts the Indonesian martial art "Pencak Silat" on a bigger map. Swimming against the tide of an inexorably digitized world, since the noughties, action movies have been experiencing a somewhat fundamentalistic revolution ushered in by ONG-BAK: THE THAI WARRIOR (2003), where a more tactile, point-blank and lethal combat style greatly relying on the performers' physical prowess sounding the death knell for a plethora of CGI-heavy schlock, and Gareth Evans takes the revolution further down that road, at any time of the day, it is more than welcomingBlanketed in its slate blue hue, THE RAID: REDEMPTION has a setting like a single-location entrapment horror flick, a catastrophic heavy blow incurs to a team of elite squad when they raid inside a tenement tower block owned by the crime lord Tama Riyado (Sahetapy) in Jakarta's slums, it turns out to be a set-up as a corollary of corruption among police top-brass. Assailed by not zombies but practically zombie-looking inhabitants (bedraggled drug addicts mostly) and a cohort of Tama's henchmen, they might find some painful irony (if they are still breathing) from recollecting the paradoxical pep talk of Sergeant Jaka (Taslim), who is leading the raid, paraphrasing here: it is a highly dangerous mission, but I don't want to see any of those seats empty when we return. The one who is bestowed with a protagonist nimbus is Rama (Uwais), a tyro in the forces and has an ax to grind in the game, when all the ammo is expended, his killer martial art skill starts to tip the scale in the bloodshed. Since its no-account story-line seldom fluctuates with plot development (barring a fraternal reunion), and although many tropes of suspense routinely deployed to the hilt, it is the action pieces taking our breath away, the go-for-the-jugular (joints, limbs, and other more cardinal parts) pragmatism and Evans' lenience on blood and guts, skewered together one set piece after another, our rapt attention becomes a given, and the brutal aesthetics reaches its crescendo in the close-range combat between Rama, his brother Andi (Alamsyah) and Tama's top muscle, a disheveled Mad Dog (Ruhian, who is a martial art virtuoso and the fight choreographer for both movies, also plays a completely different character in the sequel). After REDEMPTION successfully testing the water, THE RAID 2: BERANDAL (which means thug in Indonesian) is expectedly souped up by a significantly boosted budget and an ampler length (150 minutes, 50 minutes longer than the first installment). Mapping out an ambitious gangster turf war saga, Evans' script swiftly sends Rama to the joint to befriend Uco (Putra), the son of Bangun (Pakusadewo), one of the two kingpins of Jakarta's underworld, where a muddy mêlèe during a downpour set alight the first frisson of excitement (it is a virtue Evans doesn't overuse the worn- out slo-mo shtick, after THE MATRIX 1999 and its countless emulators, enough is enough). In fact, the resultant story veers more towards Uco's ill-conceived subversion, and Putra, not quite a martial artist himself but commendably takes up the gauntlet as a pompous gilded youth, too thrusting and wanting both wits and patience to mellow into a rightful heir of his father's cosmic empire, particularly when there is nothing to imperil his standing, what is the fuss anyway? Maybe like in every patriarch's incubus, he is just a bad seed and driven at lengths to carry out a patricidal sin, Putra's performance is vehement, visceral and transforms Uco as the film's heart of matter, a grab bag of what is wrong with today's youngsters. In the action section, on the one hand, Evans continues choreographing striking fighting sequences of Pencak Silat, and playing up the possibility of orchestration within a two-by-four space (a prison bathroom, or inside a barreling car); on the other hand, in tandem with an enclosed fistfight, he also cuts his teeth into a sterling car chase set piece with an ace in his sleeve, and what an adrenaline rush it spurs! Although it would be remiss of me to not mention a congenital hiccup rather common in action fares, those conspicuous ready-to-take-the-hit poses or caesuras, mostly from foot soldiers during their fleeting screen-time, it immediately dispels the "realness" of all the onerously rehearsed teamwork. The most pyrotechnic eye-catcher is indubitably the final showdown between Rama and the karambit-knives-wielding killer, credited as the Assassin (Rahman), which makes Very Tri Yulisman's Baseball Bat Man and Julie Estelle's Hammer Girl quite bathetic in their gore-fest, not to mention the boss who prefers heavy weaponry but is inept enough to toss it to the wrong one when the crunch comes.Both movies are cracking genre pieces made with labor of love, devotion and dexterity, and Evans' directorial flair takes a crucial peg up under the sequel's grander scale, blissfully, one can see the potential in a filmmaker which can unbridle the genre parameters.

Daniel Cronin The Raid 2 is an absolute masterclass of action cinema. It picks up immediately after the events of the first film and our main character, Rama, is almost instantly thrown right back into the world of crime that he only got a taste of in The Raid.This film excels in almost every way but lets first talk about it's main selling point: the action. The Raid 2 contains, as the title suggests, the absolute greatest action sequences that I have ever seen. Everything is brutally realistic to a point where you start to feel bad for the characters involved, but at the same time you never want the fights to stop. The martial arts choreography is something to behold, and the direction is absolutely stunning. There are very few cuts and every time there is one it is absolutely necessary and enhances the scene rather than detracting from it. The main actor, Iko Uwais, clearly did all his own stunts, which is something that you rarely see and is to be applauded.Speaking of direction and cinematography, even outside of the action this film is absolutely gorgeous. The director, Gareth Evans, has a way of making certain settings feel very real. Clean when appropriate, grimy when appropriate.The acting is great all around. Iko Uwais plays extremely well as Rama and he has a lot more to do in this movie than he did in the last. Arifin Putra does a great job as Uco, the unhinged son of a mob boss, and returning as a different character, Yayan Ruhian is incredible as Prakoso despite his minimal screen time.If I have to choose a flaw with this movie it would be that it is a bit overlong at 150 minutes, whereas the first was a comfortable 101 minutes. Despite this one minor issue I cannot stress enough that this is a must-see for any action junkie. The Raid 2 is truly amazing.The End

FlorianLaur First of all, I do not understand the complaints some people have with this movie. No guns? Indonesia isn't a country where it's easy to obtain guns. Do you watch war movies and complain "no a-bombs"? Too long? Why can't a movie be 150 minutes or even 230 or 500 minutes if it's good? Because too much over-stimulation has lowered our attention span? Then here's a good way to train it again(or the great "Love Exposure").Some complained that the story didn't make sense, that the first part had better fight scenes, etc...Naturally, the first part had to rely more on fight scenes, since they didn't have the budget for many locations or a bigger story. Here, we still get to see a lot of(creative) fight scenes, but we also get to see a car chase, some shootings, betrayal...For me, the only "complaints" are the snow scene(as beautiful as it is, it might as well snow in hell, it's Jakarta!) and...I think that's about it. And it's beautiful to watch, so it's not really a problem for me. Another small issue for me are the subtitles...my Indonesian is far from fluent, but I noticed that most of the time, the translation is far from what they're actually saying. Sometimes, it's just minor differences, but some differences are pretty big. For example, Uco refers to his father as "Sir"/"pa"(short for "bapak"). Now, "pak" or "pa" is indeed how you usually refer to older males in Indonesia(cab drivers, street vendors). But why would a son refer to his father as sir? But again, these are small things and especially the subtitles are not the directors fault, nor the actors.On the plus side, we have a real story this time. And it isn't just some cookie-cutter story line, but it's a pretty good one too! It has twists, it is exciting, it has interesting characters(and develops them). We get to see how Uco can't handle to stand in his father's shadow and how it eats him up inside...we can see how, despite being on the other side of the law(which he upheld so much in part 1), Rama realizes that the world isn't just black and white, good or bad...and that even among the "bad" guys, there are some who are really bad and some who may have strayed(Eka). Also, as someone who loves Indonesia and who's been to Jakarta countless times, I really love to see a movie in which we actually get to see this great city. It's a really nice change of venue and I wish a lot more movies would be shot in cities like this...it can be romantic(Thamrin at night, the underpass at Jl. Blora), it can be spooky and creepy(North Jakarta, parts of Grogol, East Jkt), it can be commercial(this city has probably 150 malls or more). Sure, it is unrealistically empty(anyone who's been to Jakarta will know that any street is basically NEVER empty, no matter how late at night or early in the day) and the car chase seems to be done, circling around the CBD only(which makes sense though, as Jakarta suffers from huge traffic issues and it would be a lot easier to stop traffic there than in any of the major roads). But at least it gives people an idea what this city looks like and might allow for more people to visit it.I hope that we'll get to see more good movies from Indonesia in the future, even with Gareth Evans having left the country. Before him, most of the movies they made were shallow soap opera-like romantic comedies or dramas, all of which not very appealing to non- Indonesians(and even many Indonesians, according to my friends). It's an underestimated country and I'd be happy to see it receive more international fame.

Charles Herold (cherold) The Raid 2 is a long movie, but not a very interesting one. Starting up shortly after the last one ended, the hero goes undercover with the mob in search of police corruption, but the movie ignores that in favor of a perpetually uninteresting and occasionally confusing story centered on the son of the head mobster.It's interesting reading the reviews here because they are mainly favorable and focus on how much action there was even though I felt like the action was pretty thin for most of the movie. There are some big solid fights here and there, such as a muddy one in a prison yard, but there are also long stretches of action-less, tedious storytelling. I felt like I spent a tremendous amount of time waiting for anything interesting to happen, and it wasn't until very near the end that the pace picked up, notably with a big car battle and an exciting fight involving curved blades. User reviews describe this film as more action-packed than the original, but while there may be more action in total, I suspect there's less per minute; it doesn't feel packed by any means.I watched this movie because I really enjoyed the original, but before I compare the two I have to add the caveat that I don't remember the first one that well and am going from a general impression (I seem to have forgot to review it after I saw it).The first movie had a brilliant premise in that the whole movie was a cops vs. criminals battle in a single apartment building. Movies that close the participants in, like Die Hard or Alien, offer filmmakers a sort of built-in discipline, and The Raid was tightly focused because of its structure. The sequel, on the other hand, can go anywhere and does, resulting in something rambling and fuzzy.While I don't remember the details, I do remember it was one of those movies where I would say "WOAH!" out loud from time to time as something amazing happened. I did not say "woah" once during The Raid 2, although I did say "ick" a number of times. The violence is gory and sadistic, so even when it's clever and well-choreographed, as in some subway carnage involving hammers, I found it a bit much.With characters I didn't care about, a clichéd story that didn't make much sense, and action sequences spaced too far apart, this movie never pulled me in. I don't think I'll even bother with the inevitable Raid 3.