Mat Kilau

Theres a whole debate in a movie fan group over this film. Believe or not you can't give any negative opinion over this film because people regarded this as a sort of masterpiece and people will tell you in the face that you have to make your own movie before you can give any criticism for Mat Kilau.

Tbh im never a fan of SY's works. He's like Zack Snyder except that he is way worse than him. He's all about style no substance but he got lot of fans that backed him up.

I still paid the tickets to see this. Hoping that Syamsul will surprise me because the trailer and the hype is kind of promising. But no. This is like KL Gangster except that now Jai is Mat Kilau. I wouldn't call Mat Kilau as a historical film or biography. It's more like Syamsul only use the name to deliver his own ideology or message just like he did in his movies before. The formula doesn't work here, it really doesnt. The actors kept shouting motivational quotes to your ear from beginning to end. Are there even real script here? This is the best he can do? I heard that the writers wrote the script with the messsage comes to their mind first. This is where the problem begins. The writers didnt even bother to create something that normal person would say.

Did any of the cast and crew watch the movie before release it on cinema? Did any of them even realise how disjointed the movie feels? The transition is freakin awful. It felt like some kind of rough cut that supposed to sit in editing room.

The storyline is very straightforward and thin, without much depth. It is about the exploitation of British colonisers, and how the people stand up to fight for their land.

The pacing is weak. It moves too fast from one scene to another (jumping scenes), making the story hard to breathe or digest at times.

There are plenty of action scenes. BUT they are mostly "repetitive", e.g. Fighting with the soldiers and the same "villain" again and again, making the actions flat. Perhaps a real super-villain shall be saved for the very END, so that audiences could be impressed by the REAL FIGHT! However, it's just made fights for the sake of fighting!

Besides, the camera movement is just too shaky that I give up on the action scenes, or rather feel uncomfy towards the action scenes (headache and dizzy). It's alright to have "shaky camera" technique at times, like some Hollywood movies, BUT NOT overdone throughout the entire movie from the beginning to the end.

The character development is seriously weak. There is NOTHING about Mat Kilau, other than he is a leader and good in silat. Also, we could hardly understand much about the characters of the FIVE 'brother fighters'. The emotional and sentimental value is just NOT there enough to touch anyone. As such, I could hardly feel anything, even though TWO of them died or anyone died in the movie.

There is a scene whereby the villagers (at last) came to defend the land and fight against the British. I supposed the director wanted to make an "Avengers Assemble" kind of goose-bump scene, BUT it failed badly. And perhaps due to budget constraints, everything just ended abruptly.

It leaves room for improvement in many aspects, as said above. Oh ya, it's kind of violent with slaughtering and bloody scenes, so pls beware if you were to bring children to the movie.

This movie is shallow, peppered with preachy scripts and cliches.

It needs a better writer... Character building is almost non-existent. The protagonist appeared out of nowhere, was thrown into a leadership role and started preaching about nationalism and religion. This is followed by a cliche drama where another character is envious of the chosen leader.

The preaching doesn't end there. It kept reminding you that the British were evil and tried to convince the viewers how important nationalism & religion were to them. This was done over and over again

This makes the protagonist one dimensional and they wasted such a good talent on this. Some of the minor characters have better development than the protagonist.

It needs breathing room... Some of the scenes jump around too fast, it seems as though they were rushing it in the editing room. Perhaps to include more preaching into the scenes?

Need some realism.... The costumes are inaccurate. Modern clothing and clothing items were used and its so obvious, it will throw historians & anthropologist into a fit.

The British soldiers are filled with entirely 'Punjabis'. Obviously, this wasn't the case in reality.

To create epic fight scenes, they have Yayan Ruhian. But it seems they wrote his character as an after thought.

Conclusion... If you don't care about good storytelling, character development, screenplay and accuracy, you will most likely like this movie.

If you appreciate good filmmaking and who goes to film festivals, you will want to skip this.

I decided to give it a go and try watching this movie with my family...and i just don't understand why people making a fuss about this movie... first of all screenwriting can do better... should hire someone who is actually good in doing scriptwriting ... Shamsul Yusuf should just stick to directing... you don't need to show that you can do everything but the outcome is like those tv malay drama series.......

the transition between scenes is just mediocre... its like you watching a snippet of scenes and end up gluing it together... there is no continuity on the entire movie .... jumping all over here and there....

The shaky camera works should be less.. you should learn by watching from the experts like steven spielberg's "private ryan" or any from paul. Greengrass films...oh and the kicking and puching sound during the martial arts silat sequence should be more realistic...not some recycle sound from your old KL gangster film.... lousy sound.

Should hire a proper sound designer and a good foley artist....

oh and the set designer should do more proper study on the surroundings... for example there is a scene where the landscape is showing the people doing the. Gold panning and it shows the tent is all so clean and so white.... bear in mind that scenes is at a gold mining area with all the muds etc but yet the tent is so clean.... and even the villagers costume as well as the Mat kilau crew is using a well clean , iron straight from the boutique quality..... does not feel that the villagers are living in poverty.....

the ending scene is like you suddenly realize that you are running out of money and just simply cut short the film.. there is no proper ending/ summary to this film.... even the character of Captain Syers by Geoff Andre Feyaerts during the final retreat scene is not properly develop...should develop showing the frustration / or the vengeance feeling towards the rebels and showing his vows to come again if there is any plan to do a sequel.........

i left the cinema with WTF!!! Why people say it is an awesome movie... i have seen better malay films......

if there is a sequel shamsul yusof should and.studio kembara should do more proper study and not some so so film like this.

All the weaknesses have been mentioned here by other reviews. Screenwriting, jump cuts, camera works etc etc.

My main complaint is how SY ended his film. It just end abruptly, like TOO abrupt. I'm all for film that ended on cliffhanger but there's literally certain style and technique to leave an impact to the viewer not just fade to black just after nothing remarkable happened before that. When the credits kicks in I'm just like "That's it?". Poor way to end a film that supposed to be an historical epic.