I came to watch the film with a neutral expectation; with no clue on how some of the actors had performed prior to the film except for maybe Rosyam Nor and Syamsul himself. Not knowing how much they've spent for the film (RM4mill) I wasn't gonna expect a Mission Impossible kind of quality; but still, that doesn't mean it has to sucks.
The movie wasn't really sucks but honestly, it was an attempt that is almost good. The film opens with a crime busting scene which immediately had me cringed and smirked and giggled at how ridiculous it was. But the story begins with it through an important "story establishment" with the main antagonist of the film (syamsul).
It went on and on as expected (contradicting to how others said that this film has a lot of plot twist) and one thing for sure, the film depicts that Malaysian or Malaysia police to be exact; loves to shout unnecessarily. The tone of the film seems to be very loud and intense most of the time; even when they're having a meeting in HQ they had to argue and glass were broken here and there.
The acting wasn't really impressive with Fattah Amin having the most non-related and unprofessional (for a police) facial expression; that is how I interpret it at least. Not saying that I could've done it better; but the director might want to pursue a much expressive performance by the lad. The rest of the actors gave their equally okay but awkward performance at times; resulting to a lose of chance to have the film great.
The audio and music is somewhat annoying to hear with the bangs and explosion were exaggerated not to how it looks like. The music wasn't really something that I can hum for; not like Dunkirk but then again, the film has a modest budget for Malaysian film maybe it's not directed towards the music scoring and audio production that much.
Film grading to me was poorly chosen as the color was too bright as if it was a romantic comedy films and not dark enough but then again, it's a subjective matter. But according to the camera work; I believe the color choice could have been bit more darker or dull a little bit.
There are glitches that I can observe during the chase/driving scene set in PUTRAJAYA (a scene) where I can see the road being blocked for filming purpose and the car crash was maybe an error. If we go into details then it would take me forever to write this..
I believe that Syafiq has the opportunity as always to commission a film that is fair to the budget and a bit more realistic in it's approach. Oh one more thing, the fighting scene and movement of camera were successful in making me squint or even closed my eyes a little.
Overall, it was a missed opportunity for the film to be great but nonetheless, it was an effort worth to be given support to as Syafiq make more and more films to sharpened his film craft. There are some good things in the film that maybe you can gain from; but it is up to you on how you want to take it.
For me, 5.5/10 is enough.. Watchable but not great..
