THE RAID: MERANTAU PART 2:SHIT GETS REAL

[...]action is the most important artform ever. Its language is international and can be crossculturally adapted. A roundhousekick is still a roundhousekick no matter what language. Everyone can understand the awesome power of a good kick to the head or the burning sensation of a third degree burn from a bigass explosion.No misundertandings or translation errors. It just hurts as hell.

I am quoting my mission statement for this blog. And no other actionfilm embodies my thesis as Gareth Evans  shit-I´m-gonna-be-out-for-six-months-to a year-ouch!-kind of way-The Raid. That shit hurts! Whether it is a machete tearing up a leg or a head that gets smashed against light bulbs, the violence gives you a gut reaction which is a good thing, I believe.

Most people should know the concept of the film by now: An indonesian SWAT team makes a raid against a high rise building hoping to arrest the gang leader who lives secluded Howard Hughes style at the top, all paranoid and shit with surveillance all over the place. As a result , the team gets trapped and their only way out is to fight. Shit gets primal in other words. There is howeva other forces at work of which the police officers who takes part in The Raid(Tm) are unaware of at first.

It´s a sleak concept and expertly executed by writer/director Gareth Evans and it is technically more proficently executed than Merantau. The use of sound and visuals are very creative and the location in which it takes place may be the shittiest looking place I´ve seen in a film in a long time. It really looks lived in and dirty for real which gives the film a sense of real grittiness which fits perfectly with its primal survivalist aspect.

Evans has called the film a "survival horror film" and it certainly is a vivid description of it. It´s like Night of the Living Dead but with a twist; instead of shutting themselves in from the monsters outside, the monsters shut THEM in with them. Kinda scary actually....help!

Of course the physical performances of actors Yayan Ruhian, Joe Taslim and star Iko Uwais helps deliver the intense action to make you feel all the "ouch!" "ow!" and "urgh!" in your gut.

I honestly don´t know what else to add, except that it is a work of art. A work of art that belongs in the Louvre if your idea is to wreck the Louvre, stab all the visitors with a machete in their knees and continue to the next floor.