Reviews

First of all, I have to say the rating of 8.4 is a result of hyped out Indonesian doing the vote. It's a 6 in IMDb, 7 at most, but never an 8.

What's wrong with the movie? well for one it creates a lot of questions when you watch the movie where you can't help to go "hey wait a minute" before the movie tries to make you forget about it by giving you a fighting scene. Because that's what 'The Raid' is; a cut up fighting scene stitched by what appears to be an attempt to create drama.

It's a story about a SWAT team that goes to an apartment to capture the kingpin that lurks on the top floor while slowly removing the tenants that happened to be armed and dangerous. Now, it has very terrific fighting scene and it's very well choreographed; in fact too well choreographed that it loses a sense of realism and is more similar to an 80s kungfu movie.

These exact fighting scenes that leaves small room for character development, but tragically is poorly used. My only praise goes to Ray Sahetapy who plays the bad guy for being able to be in character and being taken seriously instead of the lead player who somehow makes people smirk when he talks his line.

I know I have to somehow accept that the lead actor is there because he has martial arts skill but I couldn't help the feeling that the whole movie is highly influenced to accommodate these 'great' fighting scene. Example; for the setting of an apartment that's full of drug addicts and thugs, the room sure is big (5x5m) Which really makes you wonder why on earth would they have room those big if not to accommodate the movie equipment to shoot all the fighting going on in that room.

As an Indonesian I accept the coming of 'The Raid' as a breath of fresh air to the movie industry that is currently filled with half soft-porn half horror flick. BUT, I couldn't help feeling that most Indonesian are taking this movie waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyy out of proportion.

My two cents is this; besides the language used in the movie, this movie has nothing to do with Indonesia. It's not based on reality in Indonesia, It doesn't feel like it's in Indonesia, It doesn't represent anything Indonesia! At least in Ong Bak you could feel that this is a Thailand cinematic work of art.

If you want to watch the raid, you can expect a great fighting scene; some that's even medically impossible but to expect a movie per se, don't let the 8.4 fools you.