Operação Invasão

After seeing the trailer, I knew I had to see this movie. Rarely our my high expectation met but The Raid surpassed it. If your seeing this movie, it's because you want to see action and The Raid hit every mark. The action is a mix of shootouts, hand to hand weapons, and mostly good ol' fashioned fists.

The Raid proves again how far behind American action films are. I've seen other great foreign action films like Ong-Bak, The Protector, and Ip man but The Raid surpasses them by highlighting a martial art style not shown in any recent films. Its brutal and never lets up. It's not your typical ultra clean fighting that has been done to death but something that looks real and desperate at times as people try to survive outnumbered.

Story wise it isn't anything great but at the same time it's better than most martial arts films due to interesting twists and being incredibly well paced to before you know it its over and you want more.

If your a fan of action films, there isn't any better out there now or any even close in decades past.

My number one list action movie is The Matrix because it balanced the depth of the story with the action. Somewhere among the top list, there was also The Dark Knight for the same reason. However, when speaking only 'action', I used to choose a Hongkong movie, Flashpoint, starred by Donnie Yen. Before Flashpoint, I'll choose a Thailand movie, Ong Bak which launched Tony Jaa career internationally. Now, when I speak an action movie that speak for the action, I will choose an Indonesia movie, 'THE RAID', choreographed by Iko Uwais and Yayan Ruhiyan and starred by them.

The problem with Donnie Yen's Flashpoint was you need to wait about one hour and fifteen minutes to get the action really start but when it started, it was really worth to wait. The fight between Donnie Yen and Collin Chou, inspired by MMA especially BJJ was so well choreographed and made audience hold their breath and asking "are this sh*t a real thing?". In Evans' latest, THE RAID, you won't need those one hour and fifteen minutes because he already made the audience gasps in the first fifteen minutes.

I wouldn't say a thing about Ong Bak because in my opinion, Merantau was more superior than Ong Bak. The problem with Merantau was Gareth was trying to bring audience to understand the culture of Silat first because showing the full action.You can said, Merantau was like Yamakasi doing for parkour while The Raid was the B-13 of silat.

It is useless to review this movie from the plot because there wasn't any significant plot. The plot was made only to bridge between one action scene to other action scene. But d*mn! Even with the weak dialog and cliché plot, Gareth executed it well so we, the audience, didn't have time to analyze this or that. What we know, we were flooded by f*cking awesome action movies from infiltration scene, massacre scene, and of course, martial art scenes when the characters have run out of bullets.

I remember when one of Merantau review said Merantau was Ong Bak when handled professionally. The same can be said with THE RAID. The Raid was Flashpoint with larger actions and handled professionally from the music, cinematography, and even the visual effect.

The music composed by Aria Prayogi and Fajar Yuskemal was like a combination between Hans Zimmer's Joker theme and Rage Against The Machine. It brought the audience immediately to the brutal tone of the movie. In some scenes, those music suddenly disappeared, leaving uneasiness to the audience. I wonder how Mike Shinoda of Linkin Park will interpret the scene to his score because Prayogi and Yuskemal score was perfect for the tone of this movie and it was really different with any Linkin Park score.

The sound effect, oh my, I hardly believe this is Indonesian movie. Even Hongkong movies are rarely have this good sound effect, You can differentiate between the bullet shot next to you to the bullet shot from the next room, The sound of knife slashing was so beautiful to listen and combined by the beautiful art of Silat, the scene was a masterpiece of a brutal dance of angel of death.

THE RAID has little visual effect but when they did, it was done amazingly and effectively. Frankly, prior to watch this movie, I was a little bit disappointed when I heard there will be slow-motion scene in the movie. However, Gareth proved me wrong. He was not Zack Snyder. The slow-motion was done only in one scene and perfectly executed which I hardly imagined how it should be done in other way.

Matt Flanery and Dimas Subhono as DOP played camera creatively and yet it captured all the motion perfectly. In fact, some scenes was like a scene taken from art movie due to their creative angle but it didn't reduce the brutal tone of the movie, didn't make the impact of every punch and kick weaker, in fact, in some scenes, it enhanced the "BAM!" factor.

The choreography was the factor which made this movie popular. I have said previously that even the fight scene between Donnie Yen and Collin Chou in Flashpoint had been surpassed by almost every fight scene in the movie. In Merantau, Gareth didn't want to show the brutal image of silat due to the main character of that movie was a naive and kind young man from village. In this movie, the characters are cops and bad guy, so either be killed or kill. Both Iko and Yayan have choreographed it so well so even one reviewer said "I didn't know there was so many ways to kill people until I saw this movie" and he was right. Jeff Imada (Bourne Identity) and Yuen Woo Ping will recognize these people from Indonesia and you'll probably hear about them in coming years among the top list of fight choreographer.

After watching this movie, I found myself lost my appetite to other action movies. For me, other action movies was a snack before I can watch the next Gareth Evans project, BERANDAL.

• Kunderemp -

High Rating and Awards? People may be tricked for the first time because this movie comes from a very unusual country, Indonesia. It's not often we see action movie comes from this country. Furthermore, the casts also aren't well-known at all in the world but guess what, they're really giving a great show in this movie. Gareth Evans, a Welsh born writer/director/editor repeat his success creating action movie after several years ago releasing another action movie also made in Indonesia.

For me, the real superstar in this movie is Rama (Iko Uwais), who was introduced as a newbie special force in the team. Fantastic martial art movements, which is traditional martial art called Pencak Silat from Indonesia truly filled this movie with wowing watcher's experience. Fast moves, intense close combat and his knife play in combat successfully increased my adrenalin. The best part of Iko was when He's about to face several people alone in a hallway. That was obviously cool. I think Iko plays the part like Jason Statham (fighting) and Steven Seagal (with his knife) but only better. The Raid was rained with bloodbath. So it's wise to avoid bringing children to watch this movie.

The other character that stole my attention was this man called Mad Dog (Yayan Ruhian). In my opinion, it'll be difficult to find this kind of man in this world. His expression and fighting style was stunning.

When I watch movies, I always intensely wait for the twists. The Raid doesn't give so many twists but it still has enough twist that improve the story. Still this is a nicely written story. Simple idea but creatively developed.

At first, I thought it'll be a one man show where Rama played the whole part of fighting till the end. But I was wrong. The Raid gives fair proportion to fighters in this movie. Rama isn't the only one that showed a great fight against the enemy in this movie. There're the sarge, Andi, the last cop in control room. The only thing that disturbed me a little bit is the original dialog which is Indonesian. I don't know but it's kinda awkward for me to hear the conversation in Indonesian although it's my native language. As I imagine, it may sounds better in English. Never mind, it's just me.

With only 1.1 million spent on this action movie, surprisingly give me such a great experience in cinema. Great movie. Great job!

9/10

This is a relentless and very impressive action/martial arts movie. The fight scenes are probably from the best ones I have ever seen and the understated performances of the protagonists fit perfectly here. I m wondering how did I miss this 10 years ago...probably because it's Indonesian! Written and directed by a Welsh guy -who discovered the Indonesian lead Iko- together with a tight editing and insane fight scenes (mostly Indonesian and some mixed martial arts) makes this a must to watch for fans of the martial arts genre and not only. If you want to stay bolted at your seat while watching an action film -and you don't mind of course the violence- then check this out. From the top 10 contemporary martial arts flicks out there, 9/10.

This is no doubt one of the greatest action movies I have ever seen. This is a violent movie with very little dialogue so know that before going in. The hand to hand fighting in this film is the best to ever be put on the big screen. This movie seriously blew me away. The one flaw would be that it doesn't have the greatest plot but it's enough to keep the action interesting. Please do yourself a favor and watch this movie! .............................................................. THE RAID: REDEMPTION QUOTES Let's clean this city's mess!