The Raid 2

I have to be honest here - I didn't find the first half of the film bland or mediocre, I found quite a bit of it actively awful. There was IMO little sense of pace or rhythm to the way the story was told, just pushing one scene into the next while offering little reason to care what was going on or about any of the characters. After a beautifully composed opening shot, the film defaulted to a dull washed out look, with the occasional burst of light or colour looking confused and out of place. It's as if some locations were chosen for aesthetics alone - hardly a naturally bad thing, I hasten to add (some of the locations look amazing), but I think the film struggles to achieve a consistent look as a result.

The fight scenes, including that mud fight (Seven Samurai fondness, no doubt, and there's actually a lot of affectionate visual references throughout to the likes of Kurosawa, Kubrick and David Lynch), were damn near ruined by disappointingly excessive shaky cam work. It actually felt even worse than some of the more suspect examples of that dark art, as there was a sort of artificiality to the effect - I'd compare it to a cameraman having an epileptic fit and then the editor covering the results with a computer generated Earthquake filter. Obviously the intention is to get the viewer right in there, and that's a really admirable goal, but IMO they took it way too far and ended up actually distracting me. I don't at all recall The Raid 1 indulging in the effect to anywhere near the same degree. Add to that overzealous editing, and the ultraviolent ballet of the fight scenes felt like it was being sabotaged at every turn. There's clearly a lot of amazing stuff happening, but it's as if the film wants to make it as hard for us to enjoy as possible. The nightclub scene felt like a real missed opportunity, too - an amazing setting, but an overly contrived execution (and I found myself unreasonably irritated by the random appearance of snow :pac:)

I can pinpoint the moment when my response started to become more favourable: the tightly edited trio of fight scenes*. It's as if Evans suddenly realises how the film should look, and the cinematography and editing take on a sharp new clarity. There's far more dynamism and energy to the film from that point onwards, and like its protagonist has a newfound sense of purpose. The car chase is straight up magnificent, and the extended final gauntlet of fisticuffs, melee weaponry and explosive shotguns is certainly a sight to behold. The film actually looks great at times, in stark contrast to the murky visuals that dominated early on. I still wish Evans trusted his cast and stuntmen enough to not edit everything so hyperactively, though - especially because he shows himself capable of an expert long take on several occasions throughout, usually during the quieter moments. Great ending too - leaving a few threads hanging lest there be a Raid 3, but also pleasingly artful and efficient in presentation. Some of that narrative craftsmanship would have been very welcome early on.

I would overall consider it something of a disappointment - I really do feel it's overloaded with plotting while never feeling like anything more than a poor Takashi Kitano homage. I don't criticise Evans' ambitions to paint everything on a grander canvas - I love a good yakuza story - I was merely frustrated by the execution. It is also lacking in the strong, clear personalities (especially a definitive antagonist) that made its predecessor feel so gracefully efficient - sadly, Evans seems to dispatch the most interesting characters after offering them a bare minimum of screen time. Even Iwais' character feels lost in the melee at times. But when it does finally burst to life there's some astonishing moments and it's even more brutally physical than the first film. The action, I must stress, certainly needed a steady build up to hit with the force that it eventually does, but a full hour or more of the film is a chore to endure rather than an exciting escalation to a truly tremendous climax.
*I had to chuckle at the guy in the cinema who opted to choose the start of that brilliant sequence to take a bathroom break :pac:

Ash.J.Williams wrote: »

certain things were left open in the film to make way for The raid 3, which branches off from somewhere IN the raid 2

Well there's only going to be a limited opportunity in a sequel to further develop a lot of the underdeveloped characters, since most of them have been 'retired' in no uncertain terms :pac: I did like the 'cliffhanger', if you could call it that - it leaves some strands open, but still feels like a satisfying conclusion to this film. It's certainly not 'incomplete'. However, I'd completely agree with S.M.B. that a lot of time is spent with characters, and yet they feel wasted. When as a character of major importance, it felt jarring as he'd effectively been a non-entity up until that point. There's hints of the interesting internal conflicts going on inside Rama, but there's nothing but a bare minimum of an attempt to flesh that out. , with murky motivations and characterisation. Hammer Girl and Baseball Guy feel particularly underutilised - would feel far weightier if we'd even had a scene or two more to develop their supposed partnership.

All this, yet the film does spend something close to a majority of its running time devoted to plot and characters. It's not hard to imagine that the story would have been engaging if Evans had have spent less time fabricating convoluted gangster politics, and more time defining and exploring his characters.