The Raid Redemption is a near perfect action movie

Is the headline too much?  A reviewer should leave something to the imagination of the reader.  However, The Raid Redemption is one of the better action movies that you’ll see this year.  After the first five minutes the movie rockets forward and never looks back. 

The Raid Redemption is an Indonesian film that has 20 SWAT members raiding an apartment building that’s being controlled by an evil gang lord.  Once they enter the building things go bad quickly, most of the tenants have machetes and there’s more than one double agent.

It’s a very simple premise.  The reason The Raid is so entertaining is that the action is relentless, close and executed as perfectly as a ballet.

The first 10 minutes of the movie are gun battles in the hallway of the apartment building.  After that the group of SWAT gets smaller, they split up into two groups and the hand to hand fighting starts.

The choreography is amazing.  If you’re familiar with Jackie Chan and how well timed his fights; you will be in awe of what you see in The Raid.  If you like Tony Jaa (and are waiting for him to release another movie) you will be highly entertained.

Two standouts in The Raid are Iko Uwais and YaYan Ruhian.  Uwais plays a cop who can’t be bought; while Ruhian is Mad Dog, the main bad guy’s assassin.  Uwais displays many of the characteristics that make Tony Jaa and Chan so entertaining.  Much like Jaa, Uwais doesn’t have many opportunities to smile.  The Raid is not the family friendly martial arts that Chan does, The Raid is rated R and earns every bit of it as it’s one of the more violent movies I’ve ever seen.

Check out this scene with Uwais in a narrow hallway against four Muay Thai gang members with machetes.

Ruhian is given a typical bad guy introduction, “he doesn’t look like much but he’s ruthless” is roughly the way he’s introduced.  He’s a small guy, skinny almost, but he can do the most amazing things with his body.  How somebody that small, could do so much is a testament to his training.  In his IMDB biography I learned that he’s a master in a breathing technique that allows the body to withstand any impact.

Also of note are all of the actors who get hit.  They all sell the punches well to make the view believe that skulls are really hitting concrete or narrowly being missed by machetes.  The foley artists also leave little to the imagination with their sound effects, truly great work.

There are some twists and turns in The Raid; but they don’t stop the action or make the viewer think too hard.  This is a fast, brutal movie that fans of action or martial arts will enjoy and think about long after they watch it.

The one criticism of the movie is that the subtitles are on the bottom of the screen.    If anybody is sitting in front of you you’ll have to move to the right or left to read the subtitles.  That’s a minor inconvenience when you factor in how enjoyable The Raid was.

The Raid is the action movie that Hollywood wants to make, but doesn’t have the guts to.    They will probably make a version of The Raid, but it’ll star Bruce Willis or Nick Cage and critics will recommend the original instead.