Gundala

Joko Anwar is a great talent from Indonesia, his horror films are some of the best to be found from from that country and his upcoming Impetigore is eagerly awaited by all of us. This detour, however, was an interesting experiment. Gundala is a bit of a Marvel movie in the Indonesian way. The film is based on a famous comic book and it is gaining success with audiences and critics in Indonesia (72% rating). It doesn't say much to us, but I quite enjoyed it. The film follows the classic template: the main character gets super powers after a lightning strike and decides to protect the streets of Jakarta, where crime is increasing day by day. The interesting thing is the villain Pengkor, who has a great look, but is more of a diplomat than a fighter. The film gets builds-up interestingly when the villain calls in his army of orphans (assassins), which incidentally includes Cecep, and he has a solid fight. The film is nicely shot, the characters are interesting, the story is decent, the music is fine, there is quite a bit of action and the fights are okay (I could have done without the lightning though), and it's not the classic action mayhem we're used to from Indonesia, which is a shame because it could have been the action flick of the year, this way it's just a fine and fun action flick. I'd single out the solid fight between the kids though, that little dude was doing some very nice moves in there, the fight with Cecep and newcomer Asmara Abigail, who really impressed me. Story***, Action***, Humor>No, Violence*, Entertainment****, Music****, Visuals****, Atmosphere***, Suspense***. 6.5/10. (2020.05.19)