Every few years we get a movie that turns its
genre on its head, something new that redefines the genre and breathes fresh
life into it. Back in 2011, an Indonesian martial arts movie called "The
Raid: Redemption" took the movie industry by storm; people were calling it
the best action movie in over a decade. The last time we had seen an action
movie of the same caliber was probably "The Matrix." What "Star
Wars" was for sci-fi and "Goodfellas" was for crime,
"Redemption" changed the way we looked at action movies. It raised the
bar and brought a new standard to a genre that had been over saturated with
lazy summer blockbusters and early in the year garbage. The movie was an
immediate success; it was praised by critics as well as making 15 million off
its one million dollar budget. It wasn't long before people were asking for a
sequel; fortunately the director heard our pleas and production for a sequel
began in 2012. After a long silence the sequel has finally arrived; and the
result isn't just an improvement over its predecessor, it stands alone as one
of the greatest action movies ever made.
"Berandal"
takes place almost immediately after the events of "Redemption;" our
protagonist Rama survived the war in the apartments and was given a series of
tapes that proves a number of cops and officials in the city are corrupt.
With nowhere to go, he meets up with a detective who is head of an
anti-corruption task squad. They decide the only way to keep Rama and his family
safe is if he disappears, so they place him undercover in order to take out the
crime families that are plaguing the area; the local crime boss and some yakuza
from Japan. In order to get an in with the local crime boss, he gets arrested
and thrown in prison in order to get close to the boss's son. After two years
in prison, he earns the son's trust; and once released, he is invited to join
the father’s organization. Tired and missing his family, Rama wants nothing
more than to go home and see his family; but he realizes that he has to
eliminate the crime families and the corrupt cops. After having to get his
hands dirty, and seeing what these people are capable of, he soon realizes that
he may be in over his head. So he sets out to complete his job, and the carnage
begins.
In short,
"Berandal" improves upon its already great predecessor in just about every
single way possible. It kept what made the first one a great action movie,
while adding elements that make it a great gangster and crime thriller. The
most immediate and obvious change over "Redemption" has to be the
plot and dialog, it's substantially better. The plot in "Redemption"
was rather unoriginal and somewhat predictable, and the dialog was just plain
bad; they were and after thought and played second fiddle to the action. In
"Berandal" we are greeted with a smart and intriguing plot along with
well crafted and often intense dialog. They really brings the movie to an
entirely new level. "Redemption" really was nothing more than a
mindless action movie, you only watched it to see some awesome fight scenes;
but "Berandal" managed to capture my attention with a surprisingly
great story, and didn't let go for the entire run time. I will say that the
movie is a little longer than necessary though, it could have managed to cut 10
to 20 minutes and it would have been perfect. While it's obvious that a lot of
time and effort was put into this movie's plot and dialog, the action is why
people will come and see this movie. The first movie became an instant classic
with its action sequences, and the people behind this movie promised that they would make the action bigger and better; well I can safely say this movie will
be listed alongside some of the greatest action movies ever for generations to
come. The action sequences are truly amazing, and have some of the best fight
choreography I've ever seen in a movie. Complemented by great performances from
the actors, every action scene is just downright phenomenal. The fights are
fast and furious, and will have you giddy with excitement of seeing people just get
smashed; but that does bring me to one aspect of the movie I was not a big fan
of. This is an incredibly violent movie, more so than needed to be. I'm not a
fan of violence for the sake of violence, which this movie has plenty of. There
are several unnecessarily brutal kills in this movie that I didn't see the
point of; I know this isn't a problem for a lot of people, but it is something
that did bother me personally. One of the most strikingly obvious aspects of
the movie is that the cinematography is beautiful, and actually manages to add
to the action. The camera is always where it is supposed to be, and they pull
off a few nifty tricks that come out fantastic on camera. Probably the biggest
and only major problem with the movie is that there are some characters that
could have been flushed out more. A few characters are introduced and play a major
role in the movie, but we never really get to learn about them; their back
stories and personalities are ignored. This movie is first and foremost an action
movie, but with so much more emphasis placed on the story, it would have been
nice to see a little bit more to these characters. This is an amazing movie
from start to finish; I don't know any other way to put it. There hasn't been
another movie in recent years that has entranced me to the same extent as this one.
I've heard rumors that the director is planning to make a third film sometime
in the next few years, while it may be hard to top this movie I have faith that
he will knock it out of the park one more time. "The Raid 2:
Berandal" is a two and a half hour masterpiece of violence and chaos, and
one of the best movies so far this year.
Cons: Unnecessarily violent, a few characters
aren't flushed out, a little longer than needed.
5/5 Stars
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